


tell the nights apart (by the state of the heart and the shape of the moon)

by niallszayn



Category: One Direction (Band), Zayn Malik (Musician)
Genre: Friends to Lovers, M/M, Road Trips, Stargazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-20
Updated: 2016-06-20
Packaged: 2018-06-05 01:14:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 26,009
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6683509
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/niallszayn/pseuds/niallszayn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>"We should go UFO hunting,"</i> Niall says, and that's how it all starts.</p><p>AU where Zayn and Niall go on a road trip and discover something they didn't expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	tell the nights apart (by the state of the heart and the shape of the moon)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flares](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flares/gifts).



> I couldn't believe my luck when I got my assignment, both because of the person I wrote it for and the prompts I got. I loved them all but the UFO hunter one...I couldn't not take it. I enjoyed writing this one so so very much, I hope you like what I've done with your prompt!! I started out thinking this'd be about 10k long so imagine my surprise when it just kept getting longer and longer...I have a weakness for road trip ziall and might've let it get out of hand a bit but I hope the UFO hunting still comes through enough :)  
> I did a lot of research for this fic and I've put some further information about that in the notes at the end but they might be spoilers so I'd recommend not to read them now :) I made the picspam myself, sorry for that! :D  
> A huge thank you to the people who kept me going (who I can't name until authors are revealed), I love and appreciate you x  
> Title is from _Hotel_ by BOY

 

“We should go UFO hunting.”

Zayn just stares for a bit because he knows Niall’s obsessed with all that space stuff – he just didn’t realise he’s _obsessed_.

“What?” he asks, disbelieving.

“No, seriously,” Niall says. “Zayn, you don't honestly believe we're the only ones in the universe, do you? It's way too big, there's got to be something out there.”

Zayn sighs because he can already tell this is an argument he's gonna lose and another crazy thing he'll let himself be roped into by Niall. “No, you know I believe there's life out there somewhere. Just...not somewhere we'll find it.”

“You don't know that until you try!” Niall argues. “Look, I can easily equip my van with everything necessary and I know for a fact none of us has plans for the summer so far. You’ve got months between graduation and going back to uni and once I’ve graduated it’ll be almost as long until I start my job. Look at it like a holiday, yeah? It'll be great.”

And that's how Zayn finds himself in Niall's beat up old VW van a couple of weeks later, a bag full of food from Niall’s mum on his lap. The biggest advantage of having your mum working in the same city you live in is the constant supply of home cooked food, Niall always says.

Niall's put a big mattress in the back, a microwave and there's a couple of boxes filled with their “equipment”, as Niall calls it. It's not just the big telescope Zayn knows from plenty of visits to Niall's flat. He's really well prepared, Zayn has to admit. There's a flashlight, cameras, a digital one and a camcorder, an audio recorder, an EMF meter, a notebook and a thermometer that Zayn has no idea what it's for. It's not just that, though, Niall's also made sure to pack enough blankets and pillows to make sleeping in the van comfortable, a camping stove, plenty of water and food, a cooler and a big generator for all their charging needs. Zayn's small duffle is squeezed in there somewhere, as is Niall's.

Niall's done his research and they're pulling it off like a road trip, are planning to follow the clues across England. Or that's what Zayn has caught from Niall's ramblings, at least. He's still not really into the whole thing but Niall's his best friend so he's taking this on himself, including occasional technically illegal camping in car parks. He did agree on that, because neither of them has enough money to afford a hotel each night, or even a campsite. They'll just have to hope they won't be caught.

Zayn sighs to himself when Niall turns the key in the ignition and the engine starts with a low rumble and what sounds like a cough. It's a really old car, with only a radio to play music from. No CDs and certainly no plugging in a phone while they’re in this van. Honestly, he should work on his ability to say no to Niall.

"Cheer up, Zayno," Niall says, reaching over to shove Zayn's shoulder lightly. His smile is brighter than the light coming in through the front window. "I promise it'll be great."

Zayn smiles a little at that and reaches for the radio. "If you let me choose the music, it might."

"You love my music! You've literally called me a DJ when we shared a car before."

"That was when you didn't force me to look for bloody UFOs with you," Zayn teases. "Which aren't a real thing, by the way. At least not here on Earth."

"Okay first of all, they’re literally just ‘Unidentified Flying Objects’ and secondly, have you ever even looked into it?" Niall protests. "Why would there be so many sightings and other evidence if UFOs weren't real?"

Zayn sighs again, exaggeratedly loud. "Alright, I know you want to believe that there are aliens looking for us the same way you're looking for them, which is the only reason I'm even coming with. But I'm telling you, we won't find a thing on this trip."

“Okay, Zayn,” Niall says lightly and pats Zayn's thigh once before placing his hand back on the steering wheel. “You're still coming with on this holiday.”

*

Zayn met Niall before they even started university, during a campus tour. Zayn had come down from Bradford to tour a few campuses around London over the weekend while Niall travelled over from Ireland with his father. “It fits well, the campus tour falls on the same weekend as this unmissable football game we would’ve come here for anyway,” he’d explained to Zayn. He’d probably also told him who exactly was playing, but Zayn didn’t know enough about football to remember. Knowing Niall better, he’d guess Derby, but Niall loves many clubs.

Zayn had stood by himself as the tour guide greeted them, the strap of his backpack slung over one of his shoulders in an attempt to seem cooler and more self-confident than he felt. Niall had shuffled over from a couple feet away, fiddling with the straps of his own bag nervously. “You on your own, too?”

Zayn had nodded, taking in the pairs and groups surrounding them, the fact that he and this blond boy with a mouth full of braces that he revealed when he grinned at him actually seemed to be the only ones who’d come alone.

“D’you think we should stick together, then?” he’d suggested – voicing it as a question just in case – and Niall had shrugged cheerfully.

“Reckon we should.” He’d then proceeded to tell Zayn everything he might possibly want to know about him and asked way too many questions that for some reason didn’t make Zayn feel uncomfortable, and they’d missed most of what their tour guide told them as they’d trudged behind him at the back of the group.

Zayn insisted that the fact that he’d still chosen that uni didn’t have anything to do with Niall, who he actually managed to keep in touch with via texts, no matter what Louis had said. Who was at school in London too, anyway, so what did he even have to say.

The fact that Niall and him met up the first day they were both back in London for classes and did pretty much everything together even though they shared no classes didn't prove Louis' theory in any way.

*

"We're driving north-west from here," Niall announces after Zayn's let him drive through London traffic for a few minutes. "There's been suspiciously many sightings in Wales and in the Yorkshire area. Maybe we can stop by your parents'." His voice takes on a hopeful tinge and Zayn bites his lip to hide his grin. Niall loves his mum's cooking.

"I'm sure mum would love that," he says. "Sometimes I think she likes you better than me."

"Oh, she does," Niall teases. "I'm a real mum-pleaser, me."

Zayn groans. "That sounds wrong on several levels, mate.”

"'m just saying, I appreciate her cooking and compliment her on her hair, mums like that!"

"I do all that, too!" Zayn protests.

"Well, maybe she's just sick of you, then," Niall shoots, trying to hide his grin but Zayn spots it anyway in the crinkles by his eyes and the twitching corner of his mouth. "If I had to deal with you for 22 years..."

"Fuck you," Zayn laughs. "I'm a delight."

"Whatever you say, Zaynie. I'll ask your mum what she thinks about that."

Zayn laughs and punches his shoulder, making Niall laugh as well. "Watch out! I'm driving here, don't distract me."

Zayn shoves him again, lightly, just because. Niall sticks his tongue out at him and turns the music up. Turning to look out of his window, Zayn tilts his head up towards the muggy London sun and smiles.

It takes them a while to leave London on the busy M4 towards Wales, but Niall drives calmly and surely, eventually lulling Zayn to sleep. When he wakes, there's considerably less traffic and the predominant colour outside the window is green.

"Good morning, sleeping beauty," Niall says jokingly. He must've turned the music down, it's just a low background hum now. "Did you sleep well?"

Zayn hums. "Where are we?"

"Halfway there," Niall says somewhat cryptically. "About."

"How long was I asleep for?"

"Nearly two hours," the blonde informs him. "You okay with stopping for lunch soon?"

Zayn considers it for a moment, the hollow feeling in his stomach a clear yes. He can never stomach anything but tea or coffee in the mornings, and he pays for it later on. "Sure," he says.

"I would've stopped even if you'd said no," Niall grins. "But I'm glad we're agreeing here."

"I see how it is, you think you're in charge?"

"I am the driver, after all. I get to decide where we go and when we stop." When Zayn pouts at that, Niall laughs. "Should've gotten that license at some point, huh?"

"No, this way I get to sleep instead of concentrating on the road."

"Hey, you're designated map reader! I'm making you it, my car is too old for GPS and we might not always have reception for Google Maps. The map is in the side door."

Zayn stares at him. "Are you serious? Do you _want_ to get lost?"

"You can't be that bad, Zayn, c'mon. Everyone can read maps."

"Not under pressure!" Zayn whines. "I need time to familiarise myself with the material."

"Jesus," Niall laughs. "Go ahead, the map's there. Familiarise yourself all you want."

Zayn reaches into the compartment of his door, feeling what seem to be two thick books. He pulls out both and glances at Niall disbelievingly when he sees what it is. The bottom one is a map of all of the United Kingdom, but the top one isn't a map at all. "Niall, what the hell is this?"

"Oh, that's our logbook," he says, not at all embarrassed. "Open it, I've collected some info and we can fill in whatever we find."

Zayn snorts softly, doesn't want to hurt Niall, but really? They’re not on a ship and it's not like there's anything to find. He opens it anyway, flips through the pages Niall has lovingly filled with cut out articles from newspapers, most of them printed out from the internet, a few grainy photos and a couple of notes in Niall's loopy handwriting.

“There's plenty of blank space left for us to fill in on this trip,” Niall says. “My plan is to investigate on sight, maybe look at newspapers from around the time of the sighting and see if it leads anywhere.”

 _It won't_ , Zayn thinks but nods anyway. “I reckon that's the best we can do.”

Niall smiles at him brightly before turning back to the road. He's bathed in sunlight, plain white shirt blinding, his hair looking even lighter, sunglasses covering his eyes. They're the ones Zayn likes, black frame and glasses, simple. Niall has about four different pairs, and Zayn wonders if he brought them all. He kind of hopes Niall left the silver, reflecting kind at home. It's disorienting seeing himself in the reflection when he talks to Niall, and he doesn't like not being able to see Niall's eyes at all.

They pull off the motorway onto a service station not long after, and Niall finds a parking spot quite close to the entrance to the big building. It's busy, people occupying all the tables in the picnic area out front, eating in the warm sunshine. It's a really nice day.

“Christ, I'm starving,” Niall groans as he kills the engine and jumps out of the van. Zayn chuckles and follows, waiting for Niall to lock the car before heading for the doors side by side. Zayn pulls his own sunglasses from the front of his t-shirt where he'd stored them, putting them on and tipping his head back into the sun. Niall nudges his side and then slides his arm around Zayn's neck.

“I'm glad we're doing this,” he says, grinning but sounding very sincere. “Thanks for coming with me, Zaynie.”

Zayn slips a hand around Niall's waist, tugging him close and making him stumble a bit. “I'm only doing this to spare the others,” he whispers conspiratorially. “I'm being selfless here.”

Niall laughs loudly, throwing his head back and shoves him away. “Fuck off! I was just gonna tell you that you were the only one I could imagine doing this with but I changed my mind, I'm just gonna leave you here. Stranded and all alone.”

“Aw, Nialler,” Zayn pouts teasingly and tries getting his arm back around a struggling Niall. “You wouldn't.”

“Yeah I would! After I got some food.” He pulls a face when Zayn kisses his cheek but he's stopped struggling and his eyes crinkle behind his shades.

“I know you love me,” Zayn says and catches his hand before Niall can shove him again. “Especially since I'm gonna pay for your food.”

“Zayn Malik, have I told you recently that you’re my best friend in the entire world?” He's pulling Zayn towards the Nando’s inside, just like Zayn expected. “Can I choose what we have?”

“You've already chosen, Nialler, don't lie,” Zayn laughs. “I'm good with Nando’s, like.”

They order their food to go and the cashier takes one looks at them, asks: “Will you be paying together?”

“Yeah, please,” Zayn nods and shakes Niall's hand off his hip to reach for his wallet. This isn't the first time someone's made assumptions about the nature of their relationship, not by far. They're the touchy kind, the two of them and Louis, Liam and Harry.

Which is funny considering Liam was the first one to misinterpret their relationship. He and Niall were roommates the first year of uni, and once he'd burst in on Niall and Zayn watching a movie, cuddled up on Niall's bed.

“I'm so sorry, I didn't mean to…,” he burst out, blushing the way he always used to back then. “I didn't know you two were, um, dating?”

It didn't take more than a few weeks to get even Liam used to there not being that thing called “personal space” with the five of them. Other people don't always get it that easily.

Usually, Niall and Zayn just laugh about these things, or they leave people to assume whatever they want. It's not like it bothers them.

They take their food outside with them and find a table that's just being cleared by an elderly couple which they take over from them.

“So,” Zayn says after he’s taken a few bites and watched Niall munch on his food happily. “What’s the plan for today? Where do you wanna be tonight?”

“Well, we’re almost in Cardiff,” Niall shrugs, and Zayn cringes because he’s still chewing. “I was thinking we could spend the afternoon there and investigate a bit. Not sure if we’re gonna find anything there, but we could always head on to Swansea tonight, that was my original plan. Or stay the night and do Swansea tomorrow, maybe stop in a couple of villages on the way there. Who knows, the rural parts might be a better bet on this search.”

“I’d be okay with both, like,” Zayn says. “But I’ve never been to Cardiff before and we’d be able to take more time if we went to Swansea tomorrow so I reckon we could stay in Cardiff overnight.”

Niall grins at him, a bit of chicken stuck between his front teeth, and kicks Zayn’s foot lightly with his own. “Great. First van night, then? Don’t think we should splurge on a hostel or whatever this early on.”

“As long as I get to see a shower from the inside every now and then, I’m fine,” Zayn shrugs and traps Niall’s foot between his so he’ll stop kicking him under the table. “I don’t have any illusions about the comfort on this trip.”

“We can always try and look for public ones, like at train stations, service stations, gyms...wherever we won't have to pay much for. Alternatively, stock up on deodorant and wear hats, and stay somewhere with a shower regularly.”

Zayn makes a face at that, causing Niall to laugh. “Alright, some comfort would be appreciated.”

“I won't let you die on this trip, Zayn, I promise,” Niall teases and pulls his foot free, kicking his toes against Zayn's lightly once before smacking his palms down on the table top. “Ready? Shall we head on?”

“I'll nip to the loo quickly,” Zayn says, standing up. “Be right back.”

Niall has cleared up their rubbish when Zayn returns, but he's sitting at their table again, now occupied by two girls roughly their age. Zayn snorts quietly and rolls his eyes before walking up to them, dropping one hand on Niall's shoulder. “What was that about heading on, babe?”

Niall laughs and swivels around to grin up at Zayn, one of his hands coming up to cover Zayn’s. “I was just asking these lovely ladies about places to hit up in Cardiff. You left me all alone, after all.”

Zayn snorts again and ruffles Niall's hair with his free hand, noticing the two girls exchanging a loaded look and a head shake. It makes Zayn wonder whether they'd been hoping for a hook-up of some sort, and he feels a little relieved they seem to assume Niall and him are a couple. He's never really liked having friends hitting on him and Niall simultaneously for some reason.

Niall's hand that covers Zayn's on his shoulder squeezes lightly. “Alright ladies, thanks for the chat! I'll keep your tips in mind, really appreciate ‘em.” He gets up, keeping his hold on Zayn’s hand in the process, smiles at the girls brightly and gives a little wave. “Cheers!”

Zayn smiles in goodbye too, so do both girls, and then the two of them head back to Niall's car.

“You know they totally thought we were dating,” Niall says once they've gotten in.

Zayn laughs. “Yeah, and you didn't exactly discourage them.” He waves the hand that Niall was just holding in front of his face, making the blond grin.

“I just don’t think hooking up would be a good idea when we share this van,” he shrugs. “Where would the other person go? Also, why are you complaining? They absolutely weren’t your type.”

“I don’t have a type,” Zayn protests, offended. “You don’t know what I might’ve wanted to do with them.”

“Yeah, mate, you do. How long has it been since you last dated a girl who wasn’t blond and skinny? I don’t think I’ve ever seen you hook up with anyone else since I’ve known you.”

Zayn frowns but if he’s honest he can’t think of anyone either, at least not in the past couple of years. Huh. Seems like he does have a type.

Niall pulls out onto the motorway and wriggles his eyebrows at Zayn behind his sunglasses. “See?”

The next exit is theirs already and Zayn lets Niall focus on the road into Cardiff, following the signs towards the city centre. Zayn takes out their logbook again and flips a couple of pages until he gets what Niall has collected. Apparently there’s been plenty of sightings, most of them completely ridiculous (“like a Malteser when held at arm’s length, but orange, green, red and white”), and the most noticeable one is from 2008, when a police helicopter chased what they later insisted was a UFO above Cardiff as far as North Devon.

“We’re going to the archives of the British UFO Research Association,” Niall explains. “They save the paperwork of every reported sighting, I wanna take a look at that. I heard it’s very impressive too, huge.”

Considering Zayn loves libraries, this isn't the worst place he thinks they could start. He wouldn't put it past Niall to have chosen it as their first stop for that exact reason, actually.

“Cool,” he says, and Niall sends another smile his way.

The thing really is massive, it turns out. From the outside, it looks like a regular house - which Zayn appreciates, he doesn't want to be seen walking into a building labelled as British UFO Research Association by everyone and their grandma - but as soon as they step inside, it's like a different world. The walls of the entrance hall are covered in maps with markings all over them - sightings, Zayn assumes. They have to check in, but apparently Niall's signed them up online ahead of time so they quickly get their temporary membership passes that they'll have to return upon leaving.

They stop, in awe, when they enter the first room. There's bookshelves along every wall, tables with more maps on them grouped in the middle. The shelves are bending under the weight of folders and books stacked on them, and a doorway reveals another room with a similar layout. The documents are sorted by years, so Zayn snaps a few pictures with Niall's camera and follows his friend through the next room and up some stairs to another room. This one is almost as big as the two downstairs combined, equipped with more bookshelves and tables, a few chairs, a sofa and a telescope. In one corner, there’s two old fashioned computers. The ceiling is painted a radiant blue, a golden depiction of the zodiac in the middle. It's gorgeous, and Zayn can hear Niall gasp.

He takes a picture of the ceiling and then enters slowly, sort of caught off guard by how much he likes this. Even the thought of going through all the paperwork with Niall doesn't put him off, it maybe even feels a little exciting, like the treasure hunts he went on as a kid.

“Apparently they have a really modern office somewhere here, only for staff, to keep up to date and stuff,” Niall explains. “But the rest here seems really old fashioned. Everything that can be on paper is on paper, and the videos are on CDs you can put into those computers over there.” He grabs a folder and opens it to show Zayn the bunch of CDs stored in the front, then lowers his voice. “UFO researchers are also big on conspiracy theories, so they obviously can’t store this information in any sort of digital database where it could be viewed by the government.”

He raises his eyebrows comically high at the last word and Zayn snorts. “Obviously,” he says and Niall giggles.

They decide to go as far back as two years ago but not any further, because that already seems like plenty of folders. There are a lot of things to be disregarded, much like on the internet, but there’s also a lot more that hasn’t made it onto the internet, or at least not to somewhere where Niall found it.

Zayn is responsible for marking their map up with spots worth visiting and planning their route, while Niall copies down names and addresses of people he wants to talk to. “If they willingly gave the UFO Research Association their contact details – look, they’re even being updated – they won’t be surprised someone’s coming to visit them,” Niall reasons and Zayn tries not to consider the possibility that they’re being kept tabs on secretly.

They spend a couple of hours like this, and when they pack up their things, it’s not just with the info they’ve gathered. Zayn has also taken a picture of Niall while he was laughing at a particularly funny sighting, one of him bent over the folders, looking deep in thought; they’ve taken one of both of them posing with the telescope on self-timer and attempted a selfie with the zodiac drawing on the ceiling.

He posts the one with the telescope on Instagram, captioned “we’re going on an adventure!” with a couple of space related emojis. Louis, Liam and Harry are the first ones to like it.

They’re both in a great mood, even when they get caught trying to sneak out without handing in their passes and have to give them back anyway.

“Let’s get a couple of beers,” Niall suggests as they head down the stairs in front of the building. It’s still light out and even remotely warm, the air smells of wind and salt. “We deserve a celebration to start this trip with, and we can only microwave my mum’s food on the van.”

Zayn shrugs. “Yeah, alright. Find a Tesco?”

*

They end up in the corner of a small car park, under the low branches of a tree that’ll hopefully hide them from CCTV well enough to cover up that they’re actually spending the night in their car. The hood of the boot is open and their sat on the mattress in the back of the van, legs hanging out, beer in hand.

“Can’t wait until we get to the countryside,” Niall says quietly, head tipped back against the side panel of the van. “We’ll be able to see the stars from there.”

Zayn hums. “That’d be nice.”

“It’s what I miss most living in London. Not seeing any stars when you look up.”

Zayn thinks back to the time he came to Ireland with Niall and they lay in the garden for half the night, just looking up at the stars. It was a great night.

They empty the entire six-pack with their microwaved food and Zayn feels pleasantly buzzed, Niall scratching at his head where it’s placed in Niall’s lap.

“I’m glad you’re coming along,” Niall mutters. His fingers feel strong and wonderful against Zayn’s scalp. “This wouldn’t be half as good without you.”

“Are you saying I’m better company than your UFO friends?”

Niall laughs softly. “Well, you’re doing this even though you know we won’t find anything, I guess that says it all.”

“Did you just admit we won’t find anything? Niall Horan, is that you?”

“I think whatever life is out there is probably way too clever to be caught by two amateurs on their summer holiday.” Niall’s shrug jostles Zayn a little. “But it can’t hurt to try anyway. And see the country along the way.”

“A road trip,” Zayn cheers weakly.

“Exactly,” Niall says and shifts to press a kiss to Zayn’s forehead. Then he slowly slides out from under Zayn and stretches. His shirt rides up and exposes the waistband of his pants and a strip of skin. Zayn tracks his movement lazily.

They have to break open their first canister of water to brush their teeth and get ready for bed later because there’s no public bathroom or anything nearby. They’re only using their torches sparsely as to not call any attention to their – technically illegal – stay in the car park, so it gets a bit complicated when they undress and try to arrange themselves and their blankets in the back of Niall’s van.

Zayn pokes Niall's side with his elbow and Niall accidentally slaps him while taking his shirt off, but eventually, they settle in. It’s close quarters, but it’s not like Niall and Zayn aren’t used to proximity. Zayn’s asleep in a minute.

*

He wakes up with Niall’s nose pressed to his neck. It’s no surprise, not really, since Niall is known to be extra cuddly when he’s sleeping. What is surprising, however, is that thing Zayn's awake before Niall is. Maybe the driving tired him out more than he said.

Zayn decides to be a good friend and get them breakfast, also because the van isn't all that comfortable in the daylight. It feels stuffy and crowded, so he quickly pulls on jeans and a t-shirt, adds one of Niall's snapbacks to hide his hair that's probably starting to get greasy and leaves the van as quietly as possible.

He has a quick smoke, then gets them coffee and breakfast muffins from the McDonald’s around the corner. When he arrives back at the van, Niall is awake and dressed, grinning at him. “I was hoping you’d get us breakfast,” he calls and reaches out to take half of what Zayn’s carrying. “You’re my hero.”

Zayn shrugs. “Figured you had enough responsibility with the driving, I didn’t wanna burden you with getting breakfast as well.”

Niall laughs. “Speaking of, we should probably leave soon. We have at least one stop in between here and Swansea and I don’t know how long it’ll take us to get him to talk.”

Not long at all, it turns out. The drive to the tiny Welsh village by the sea doesn’t take long from Cardiff, they’re there well before lunch. The name of the guy they’re looking for is Rhys Davies, and they find the address given in the documents of the British UFO Research Association easily enough.

“Right,” Niall says when he parks the car in front of the small house. It’s a cottage made of stone, whitewashed, with a sleet roof. “No idea how he’ll react to random blokes showing up at his front door because they want to know about the UFO he saw a couple of years ago. So if he sends us away…”

“It’ll be fine,” Zayn chuckles. “Don’t worry, Niall. It’s not like I have high expectations.”

Mr Davies; in his fifties, dark hair turning grey, about as tall as Niall and Zayn are; tells them to call him Rhys as soon as Niall has explained what they’re here for, and proceeds to invite them in for lunch and a proper conversation. Lunch extends to tea as they talk, more about other things than the UFO Rhys claims to have seen – he was part of the police crew who chased the UFO as far as Devon in a helicopter. He doesn’t give them much more info than they already found on the internet, but he helps them figure out their route, gives them addresses, names, telephone numbers of people who might know something.

Zayn likes him, even if he thinks the man must be at least a little bit crazy. He likes him even more when, after Niall explains they should leave because they have to get to Swansea in time to find accommodation for the night, he says, “Swansea? I have a friend who runs a campsite in Swansea, I could give him a ring and tell ‘im you’re coming, he’ll give you a discount.”

“You’d do that?” Zayn asks.

“Sure, us believers stick together, eh?”

Zayn nods politely and thanks him but avoids looking at Niall. He fears he won’t be able to hold in the laughter bubbling up in his chest if he does.

They part from Rhys with many thank yous, their notebooks and map much more detailed than before.

“Well,” Niall says once they’re back in the van. “That went better than expected.”

Zayn snorts and then laughs a little when Niall joins in. “He was nice, but you have to admit the whole “believer” thing is a bit crazy.”

Niall laughs and starts the engine. “Yeah, but it’s good for us, isn’t it? We belong to their community, they’ll help us much more willingly than if we were journalists or something. They think we won’t make fun of them.”

“Good thing they’re not in this car with us.”

*

It doesn’t always go as smoothly.

Over the next couple of days, they meet more people like Rhys who offer them lunch, tea, even a bed for the night and tell them everything they want to know. Others send them away after they’ve explained their intentions, some seem to feel threatened by them. Some don’t even answer their doors.

“This is the downside of the whole “believer” thing, I guess,” Niall sighs after they’ve been turned down by the third person in a row. “Many of them believe the weirdest conspiracy theories and trust no one.”

“Constant vigilance,” Zayn says in a bad impression of Mad Eye Moody from Harry Potter, just to make Niall laugh. It works.

It’s been eight days since they left London and they haven’t learned much but names of people who might be able to tell them more, but Zayn doesn’t mind. They’ve had some funny encounters, slept in car parks, guest beds, camp sites and seen the most incredible landscapes, he’s enjoying their trip more than he expected. Niall keeps their logbook meticulously updated with every little scrap of information they gather, writes down what they did during the day every single evening and glues in the newspaper articles he finds relevant for their “research”. They’ve gotten pretty good at unpacking and packing their equipment, and by now Zayn knows what it’s all for.

The EMF Metre to measure electromagnetic fields and document abnormal frequencies, thermometers to measure temperatures (they’ve gotten to use those exactly one time, when one of their contacts told them aliens had come into her house to kidnap her cat), the telescope for stargazing and absolutely no sightings of UFOs and full range cameras to film and photograph further into the light spectrum, from Infrared to Ultraviolet. They can take regular pictures too, though, and Zayn’s positive he’s taken more pictures of the landscape with the digital camera than of “evidence”.

Their route across Wales has sort of been a crisscross pattern, from Swansea further west to St Clears and Haverfordwest, then slowly up north to Cardigan and Aberporth, from the coast to the centre of the country, like Llandovery or Brecon, and back again. They're pretty central now, in Knighton, and for once it's not to visit a contact or find the place of a sighting. Zayn's kind of glad to have a day off walking around with an EMF meter or listening to another (frankly, probably crazy) person talk about extraterrestrial life and its activity on earth.

Instead, they're here to watch stars. Although Niall would probably hit him over the head if he heard him put it like that.

Knighton is tiny, but the observatory on top of the hill is quite big. The red brick building has been built high up and Zayn thinks that the view alone would be worth the drive. It’s a clear day and he can see far across the hills and valleys from where he’s stood at the edge of the car park of The Spaceguard Centre and Observatory.

“Pretty isn’t it?” Niall asks, stepping up next to him. “I’ve been meaning to come here for a long time.”

“Not for the view, though,” Zayn grins and nudges him lightly. “Let’s get our tickets, yeah? I wanna catch the next tour at two.”

Niall laughs and hooks his arm through Zayn’s pulling him along to the entrance. “You’re a really good friend, thanks for letting me do all of this.”

“Hey, it’s not _just_ for you,” Zayn says. “I have an interest in space. Not necessarily in UFOs but this is the one stop I’m genuinely interested in, too.”

“That's good,” a voice Zayn doesn't recognise says and he turns around to find a man about his parents’ age grinning at them, arms akimbo. “I'm Jay Tate, I'm the director of this centre and I'll be doing the tour. Are you gentlemen the only two visitors?”

“Uh,” Zayn makes, “I don’t know? I mean, we’re the only ones that came together, like, but there’s more cars outside.”

“Oh, well,” Mr Tate shrugs. “There’s still a few minutes left, they’ll come in.”

“We haven’t gotten our tickets yet either,” Niall pipes up. “Come on Zayn, we’ll do that now.”

“Oh, you’ll have to buy them off me,” Mr Tate says. “There’s only one other person working here apart from the volunteers and we try to take shifts, so I’m doing it all.”

Niall throws Zayn a surprised glance but takes out his wallet quickly. “Alright, we’ll take two, then.”

“That’ll be £7 each then, or £14.”

“I’ve got it,” Niall mumbles to Zayn and Zayn’s given up discussing. They’re gonna come out even somehow.

A family walks in to get tickets next, parents with two boys around 10, followed by three girls who seem to be on holiday as well. Another group joins them and it takes Zayn a couple of minutes to figure out how they’re related. A grandfather who looks about 90 years old, his daughter and her husband, their son and his partner. Zayn spots the mother of the first family staring as the two men share a brief kiss and rolls his eyes at Niall who very demonstratively puts his arm around Zayn’s waist and sticks his tongue out at him.

Zayn doesn’t mind playing up the fact they get mistaken for a couple so often and sticks his hand into the back pocket of the jeans shorts Niall’s wearing. Niall only grins wider.

“Are you warm enough?” Zayn asks because he’s wearing jeans and a t-shirt and thinks it’s a bit chilly. Niall in his shorts and dark blue t-shirt can’t be much better.

“Yeah, no problem,” Niall shrugs though and straightens his grey cap. “Why, are you cold?”

“No, just thought you might be. With the shorts and all.”

“We’ll be outside for parts of the tour,” Jay Tate speaks up again and Zayn wonders if he listens to all the conversations the guests have. The man turns to the whole group. “Make sure you’re warm enough, it can get chilly here after a while. My name is Jay Tate, I’m director of the Spaceguard Centre and Observatory, and I’m your guide today. Call me Jay.”

They start the tour around the small red brick building that seems to be office, research centre and planetarium at once, from what Jay points out along the way. “Our first stop is our planetarium,” he says, ushering them through a door into a small round room with a projector in the middle pointing up at the dome-shaped roof. A mini planetarium. “Please, find a seat.”

There’s space for about twenty people in a circle around the projector and the mother uses the spare seats to keep her children away from Niall and Zayn. Zayn throws her a dirty glance and places his hand high up on Niall’s thigh. His friend raises a surprised eyebrow, then spots the woman and leans back more comfortably. Zayn’s hand stays.

Jay turns down the lights and starts the show. He does the commentary himself and begins with explaining how the moon was formed from debris of the Earth after it was hit by an asteroid. “Which leads me right to an important difference. Many people use “asteroid”, “comet” and “meteor” as synonyms when really they’re vastly different. A comet is a chunk of rock and ice. When it gets closer to the sun, the ice and different gases like methane and ammonia vaporise and form a cloud-like shell called coma. Under the pressure from solar winds and the sun’s radiation, the shell forms a tail. Asteroids don’t have those tails since they’re formed solely of metals and rocky material, nothing that could vaporise. Now, meteoroids are basically small asteroids. They’re smaller than a kilometre and often so small they completely vaporise in the Earth’s atmosphere. As soon as they enter our atmosphere, we call them meteors. This name refers to the flash of light caused by the debris when it burns up in the atmosphere, not the debris itself. You might also know them as shooting stars.” He waits a few moments until the murmur this has caused among the two small boys on Zayn’s right has calmed down and then continues. Zayn looks over to Niall, who hasn’t said a single word although he probably knows all of this already, and finds his eyes still glued to the ceiling. His face is illuminated by the shooting stars flashing across the screen and his eyes seem dark blue. He looks…content, and Zayn’s heart lurches suddenly and violently. He’s beautiful. “Now, if any part of the meteoroid survives the fall through the atmosphere and reaches the Earth’s surface, we call it a meteorite. Usually, the meteorites are very small, but they can weigh 100 kilograms or more. The bigger they are, the more they destroy when they hit the planet.”

They learn how stars and planets are formed, the difference between the two and how the gravity of all the planets affect asteroids, that northern lights – or aurora borealis – are the gusts of solar winds that reach the atmosphere, before Jay turns the lights back on.

Zayn blinks, feeling dazed. He finally takes his hand off Niall’s thigh and tries not to think about that strange moment in the middle of the show. It was probably just the mood, the lights and the background music or something.

“If you’ll follow me, I’ll show you samples of some of the things we just heard about. Quite a few meteorites arrive here.” Zayn gets up to follow Jay and Niall does too, takes his hand like it’s the most natural thing in the world. It’s probably to annoy that lady, Zayn thinks and very deliberately doesn’t dwell on how nice Niall’s hand feels in his.

The tour moves on to the next zone, a big telescope. “This is one of our two telescopes,” Jay explains. “We’ve installed a second one but still need more funding to be able to use it regularly. Our work is to spot Near Earth Objects, or N.E.O.s, and to identify the dangerous ones. We’re involved in ensuring they’re either destroyed or deflected before they hit us, but we obviously don’t have the measures to actually do something ourselves. Our job is it to inform the bigger organisations who then do something about it. If the meteoroids are small enough, they can be blown up in space and the resulting debris will burn up in our atmosphere and cause a meteor shower. If we’re facing an asteroid though, we have a bigger problem. Does anyone know why?” He looks around the group but ignores Niall in favour of focusing on the kids. They look at him wide eyed.

“Can we blow it up, too?” one of them asks and the other makes an exploding sound. Zayn grins.

“Unfortunately not,” Jay shakes his head. “Asteroids are too big to blow up, the debris wouldn’t vaporise in our atmosphere, instead thousands of meteorites would hit and most likely destroy our planet. This is one of the reasons why asteroids have been monitored for years, to ensure we know early on if we’re in danger of being hit by an asteroid. The only option we would have in that case would be to send up a spaceship to fly alongside the asteroid. Of what use might that be?”

This time, he nods at Niall who lets go of Zayn’s hand. “I assume it’s in the hope that the spaceship’s gravitational force can redirect the flight path of the asteroid, right? It would probably just change it minimally, but it could be enough.”

“Correct. It would take years, but it would most likely be enough to steer the asteroids a few hundred kilometres past the Earth.” He takes the time to look at every single member of the group. “As you see, it’s rather important someone looks up and tracks the movements of everything else but us. We, however, are the country’s only tracking device of near misses. So wherever else you’ll go, we’ll be the only ones able to tell you about what we’ve escaped in the past.”

As they tour the rest of the area, Jay explains more about their work and the Spaceguard Centre in general, and Zayn thinks it’s really impressive what they do with just two people working there and only volunteer funding.

The whole tour takes a bit over an hour and a half and when it’s over, Zayn feels like he learned a lot and he tells Niall as much.

“Yeah, me too,” the blond nods. “I mean, I know a lot about space – but there’s still so much more to learn and I feel like some of it was included in this tour. Even the things I technically already knew…it was good to freshen them up, dunno. It was sick.”

They thank Jay Tate for his enthusiastic and informative tour, donate all the spare change they have in their pockets and get back into Niall’s van to head to their next destination.

The drive to Newtown takes about 45 minutes and they’re there around 5pm. The lady they visit is one of the friendly sort, she asks them in for tea and biscuits in a living room that screams “crazy cat lady” and won’t stop talking to them about the aliens that abducted her son. Zayn thinks she’s absolutely nuts but at least she lets them spend the night in her driveway and even offers them to use her bathroom. He’s too thankful for the proper shower to nitpick.

In the morning, they thank her and leave with a box of homemade cookies that they’ve finished before they stop at a gas station where they’d planned to pick up breakfast and fill up the tank. Zayn gets them a couple sandwiches they can have for lunch later instead. While he’s waiting to pay – there’s an old man in front of him who apparently thinks it’s essential to recount some longwinded tale about his sheep to the seemingly very interested cashier lady – Zayn spots something else. He smiles and adds it to his small pile.

When he gets back to Niall, he hands him the small package he bought.

“What’s this?” Niall asks and looks closer. When he looks up again, his smile is blindingly bright. “You got me Glow-in-the-dark-stars?”

Zayn shrugs sheepishly. “I saw them and thought we could stick them on the ceiling of the van, if you want.”

Niall shakes his head, grin still wide. “You’re ridiculous. I love them, thank you. We can put them up tonight.”

*

They’re in another tiny village by the sea called Barmouth and it’s a beautiful day, hot and sunny. Another name on their address list has been crossed off after the man didn’t even open his door for them. Zayn could swear he saw his curtain move though, so it was probably another crazy conspiracy theorist. They’ve driven here through Snowdonia National Park – hundreds of photo opportunities – with the windows down and music turned up, Niall’s hair is windblown, nose tinted red with a beginning sunburn under his sunglasses.

“We should go to the beach,” Zayn blurts out, and Niall turns to him with a surprised expression.

“What? May I remind you that you can’t swim and usually don’t make a secret how much you hate beaches and swimming pools and all kinds of open water?”

“I don’t hate beaches,” Zayn protests. “I don’t like crowds – especially on the beach – and I don’t like people pressuring me into going in. It’s really warm, though, and I know you love the sea. So why don’t we find a nice spot and you can take a dip?”

Niall laughs and shakes his head. “I can’t believe this is coming from you. But yeah, let’s. Sounds like just the right thing to do on a day like this.”

Barmouth isn’t much more than the tiny harbour they have, a few houses, a long bridge for the train, a hiking trail called Mawddach Trail along the coast and the abandoned railway track – and the beach. They stop in a car park with a sign to the beach a few hundred yards after the last houses and grab their things to walk across the dunes to the beach.

It’s beautiful, Zayn has to admit, and the sea doesn’t look all that intimidating from here. Maybe it’s because the mountains behind them seem so wild in comparison. His phone’s filled with pictures of the Welsh landscape already, but Zayn takes a few more anyway. Then one of Niall looking into the distance, just to have a little variety.

There aren’t many people at the beach besides them, so they easily find a spot where Zayn doesn’t feel bothered by anyone around them. Niall’s changed into his trunks and run off to the water before Zayn has had time to put down his towel and he shakes his head fondly, places both his and Niall’s towels carefully on the sand next to each other, even puts rocks on the edges as weights so they won’t fly away. Then he puts on his own trunks and lies down, decides to have a smoke first.

Before long, he turns around and sits back up to watch Niall. He finds his blonde head, darker now that it’s wet, bobbing up and down on the waves a small way out. It’s not the first time he wishes he knew how to swim and Zayn sighs. Maybe he’ll go dip his toes in later.

When Niall gets back, he shakes his head like a dog so there’s no way Zayn won’t end up wet. He yelps when the cold drops hit him and jumps up, attempting to push Niall over into the sand to get back at him.

Unfortunately, Niall expects him and flees out of his reach, laughing loudly. “You’ll never catch me, Malik,” he calls, and that’s a challenge Zayn’s willing to accept.

He charges after the blond, follows him down to the water and back up again until he finally catches up, breathlessly, and manages to make Niall stumble and fall. Niall reaches for him and with another yelp, Zayn falls too, landing smack on top of Niall. Who’s wet and very, very sandy.

“You dick,” Niall pants, laughing. “I can go right back into the water to clean this off now.”

“You started it,” Zayn grins petulantly like a child and pushes himself off of Niall’s chest – feels his scratchy chest hair against his palm – and stands up. His skin feels weirdly tingly, maybe because of the sand.

“Help me up, then,” Niall orders, lifting a hand lazily. “It’s the least you can do.”

Zayn does, but only because he’s still too distracted by the strange sensation feeling Niall’s skin against his seems to have caused. He suddenly remembers the moment from the planetarium and has to close his eyes for a second. He’s always known his best friend is attractive, but what on earth is happening to him now?

“Hey, you alright, Zayno?” Niall asks. “You look a bit pale suddenly.”

“Just a bit dizzy,” Zayn mumbles. “Maybe it’s too hot.”

“You should sit down and drink something,” Niall says and ushers him back to their towels. He hands him to a bottle with lukewarm water and fusses until Zayn gets annoyed and snaps at him that he’s fine. Thankfully, Niall isn’t the type to be offended easily, just shrugs and lies down next to Zayn.

They have a barbecue later even though Zayn would bet it’s forbidden out in the open like this. They use some of the newspapers they have stacked everywhere they could find space in the van. The thought behind it had been to find clues in them but all it has resulted in is a couple dozen newspapers taking up precious room. They’ve cut out four or five articles max, and none of them have really brought them further. Then again, Zayn hasn’t felt like they’re really trying to find actual clues or proof or whatever in days. They’re sort of just doing a road trip and interviewing weird people.

At least the newspapers are good material to get the fire going. Zayn rolls a joint with the last weed he brought along and they share it while they wait for their food to be cooked.

“Imagine if we actually found aliens,” Niall says and passes the spliff back to Zayn. “Like, neither of us really thinks we’ll find anything but what if we just…rounded a corner and there they are?”

“What, aliens?” Zayn laughs, smoke billowing. “Little green men?”

“Whatever they look like.”

Zayn laughs again. “You’re high, babes.”

“So’re you,” Niall pouts and Zayn reaches out to clumsily pat his head. He gets a bit distracted by the structure of his hair and cards his fingers through it languidly.

“Your hair’s soft.”

“Maybe there was something in that shower at the beach to make it feel like this,” Niall thinks out loud and then groans, a low sound in his chest that makes Zayn feel strangely warm all over. “Keep going.”

So Zayn does until they get hungry enough to check on their food.

Much later, they decide it’s time to put up the glow-in-the-dark-stars that Zayn got at the gas station in the morning. They barely glow since they’ve been in their box all this time, but Zayn places his phone on the small cupboard where they store most of their stuff, puts the flash on and directs it at the ceiling. The van doesn’t give them much space to move around each other so they just kneel on the mattress and stick star after star wherever they can reach.

“My van is gonna be the prettiest van ever,” Niall says, dreamily traces the stars they’ve already put up with his fingertips. He looks soft and tired and absolutely stunning in the dim light. There’s something sexy about the way his eyes get half lidded when he’s drunk or high, Zayn can’t help but think.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “The prettiest.” In his current state he can admit he’s not sure if he’s talking about the van or its owner.

*

In the light of day the stars on the ceiling of the van look a bit skewed, but Zayn thinks he likes them anyway. They have personality.

Niall isn’t there anymore but he can’t see him outside of the van either so Zayn gets out and stretches before putting on the cleanest shirt he can find and going to look for Niall. He doesn’t have to walk far towards the beach until he spots Niall coming back from what must’ve been a morning swim followed by a shower under the pipe used for that near a shed at the top of the beach, where he’s coming from.

He’s wet and the morning sun glistens on his chest and arms, his hair ruffled like he’s run his hands through it a couple of times. Zayn swallows and vows to pull himself together, then lifts his hand in a wave.

“Morning, sleepyhead,” Niall grins when he’s within hearing range. “I assumed you wouldn’t wanna take a dip with me.”

“You assumed right,” Zayn says. “Coffee?”

“God, please,” Niall all but moans and Zayn really needs to get a grip. This is his best friend, for fuck’s sake.

They leave soon after Zayn’s taken a “shower” too, their last address in Wales is in Bangor. It’s a university town so they plan to stay the night and go out, maybe even find a club. Zayn’s even saved a clean shirt for it.

They make it there in less than two hours, which leaves them plenty of time to find a hostel for the night and somewhere to have lunch before they go to meet their last contact. It’s raining when they arrive so they go to the first Nando’s they see and use the free WiFi to find a cheap hostel near the city centre with a decent rating.

The third one they walk into still has two beds available, even if it’s in an 8-bed-dorm, but they take it because apparently Bangor in the summer isn’t vacant. Parking is inclusive though, so are towels and sheets, they have clean showers and it’s just £11 a night per person so it isn’t that much of a hardship. They don’t even have to talk to the other people in their dorm if they don’t want to.

Their meeting with Owen Driscoll, UFO researcher and self-proclaimed investigative journalist, takes up most of the afternoon. Apparently he’s spotted UFOs several times while he still lived in Conwy, about 20 minutes away, and once since he’s moved to Bangor. “It was always the same one,” he tells them. “Three silver balls in formation, very low in the sky. That can’t have been a coincidence.” They learn about a few more conspiracy theories, a wild story about a UFO race and where to find a UFO crash site that’s conveniently in the middle of their drive from Bradford back to London.

They return to the hostel only to put their valuables into the lockers provided by their bunk beds and get ready for their night out. They shower in adjoining showers exactly as long as it takes to duet on “California Love” (which sounds pretty sick, if Zayn says so himself) and do their hair next to each other singing “I Want It That Way”.

They’re often being made fun of for their singing, but there’s few things Zayn likes better than dueting with Niall on songs they both love. Sometimes they even play small sets at open mic nights when Niall’s been particularly persuasive, just them and Niall’s guitar.

Right in time for dinner they arrive at a pub that’s already pretty crowded with mostly young people, order fish and chips and a pint each. “I’m really looking forward to your mum’s cooking,” Niall says. “Don’t get me wrong, I love Nando’s and fish and chips but even I have a limit for those.”

“Believe me, so do I,” Zayn sighs. “Mum’s really looking forward to having us stay over a couple of days. She’s probably already started cooking.”

Niall laughs. “Probably, yeah. It’ll be nice having a bed and a shower and home cooked meals, being poor students doing a road trip does have its downsides.”

“Hello there, lads.” There’s a girl at their table, dressed in all black, her long blond hair in a ponytail, leaning forward with both of her hands on the table top. “Got space on that table of yours for two lonely girls?”

She nods her head back towards her brunette friend then turns back to smile at both of them. Zayn raises his eyebrows at Niall who raises his back and then does a half shrug. “Sure,” Zayn says to the girl, interpreting Niall’s response as an okay. They do have space after all, and all the other tables are in use as well.

The girls sit down with their drinks while Niall and Zayn make room for them. “I’m Beca,” says the blonde, “and this is Gwen.”

“Niall and Zayn,” Niall introduces them, gesturing from himself to Zayn.

“I haven’t seen you two around before,” Beca says.

“That’s because we’re just passing through,” Niall explains and looks over at Zayn for a second. “We’re…on a road trip.”

“Oh, nice,” Gwen pipes up from where she’s sat next to Niall. “Through Wales? Where are you from?”

An hour or two pass quickly because the girls are good company and know great stories about Bangor because they’re both from nearby and now go to university here. They take Niall and Zayn to the club they’re headed for, Half Acre Nightclub, and Zayn’s pleased to find the entry fee is only £3. They get drinks at the bar – reasonably priced as well – but the girls say goodbye and disappear into the crowd quickly once they’ve finished theirs. Zayn’s relieved they don’t seem to have been looking to pull or something because he hates trying to explain to people why he doesn’t want to go home with them.

Niall’s organised them more drinks, shots this time, and downs his quickly, then another, his cheeks and throat already a splotchy red. He deals with crowds better when he’s drunk, and he’s well on his way. A little guiltily, Zayn wonders how far down Niall’s blush goes past the open collar of his short sleeved shirt.

“Come on Zaynie, drink up and dance with me,” Niall shouts over the music and Zayn laughs quietly into his glass before he empties it and follows Niall.

It’s too loud to talk so they just dance until they get thirsty and buy more drinks. In the back of the club there’s a couple of booths to sit down and they find two spots in one of them for a while. Niall leans his head on Zayn’s shoulder and Zayn lifts a lazy hand to run it through Niall’s hair.

“Alright, babes?”

Niall hums. “Drunk. This is fun though. Love partying with you.”

Zayn doesn’t reply, just keeps scratching Niall’s scalp. “Ni? Do you want to stay or are you tired?” he asks after a while. It’s hot and the air feels stuffy.

“Can we go?” Niall asks. “There are so many people everywhere.”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Zayn nods and gets up, holding out his hand for Niall. “Let’s go.”

After making sure he’ll be alright for a few more minutes, Zayn leaves Niall at the edge of the bar to nip to the loo. There’s a queue, which is a sign for how busy it is since Zayn can probably count on one hand how often he’s seen people queueing for the men’s room, and when he gets back, Niall isn’t alone anymore.

He’s leaning against the bar and there’s a handsome dark haired giant of a man talking to him, body curved over Niall’s in a way that makes his intentions more than obvious. Niall either doesn’t notice or doesn’t mind, he’s laughing at whatever the guy just said and Zayn feels something very ugly wash all over his insides. Someone is flirting with Niall, and Niall’s flirting back.

For a few seconds, Zayn just stands there and watches, unsure what to do. He can’t leave, but he doesn’t want to stay and watch either. Then he stops to examine what he feels closer. Even through the haze of alcohol in his blood, it’s pretty obvious to Zayn that he’s jealous.

 _He_ wants to be the one flirting with Niall, he wants Niall to laugh at _his_ jokes, he wants to be the one who gets to take Niall home tonight. Every night.

Fuck.

Zayn stands and watches as big guy touches Niall’s arm and then his chest, realisation sitting heavy in his chest. He has a crush on his best friend, and not just a small one.

There's no time to wonder about how long this has been going on, how he never noticed, what changed now to make him notice and what is gonna change as a result of this.

He has to make a decision, and a quick one. Let Niall flirt with the guy and leave or go up to them and most likely ruin every chance Niall has of pulling tonight? He knows what he _wants_ to do, but Zayn also knows what would be the right thing. He wants Niall to be happy after all, more than anything. Then again, how good of an idea would it be to leave Niall alone in a club in a foreign town with a stranger?

“Zayn, you alright?” Niall's next to him, waving his hand in front of Zayn's face. “You look like you've seen a ghost in the bathroom.”

“No, yeah, I was just-” Zayn looks around but doesn't spot big guy anywhere. “I thought you wanted- and…”

“What?” Niall asks, looking around as well as if to find what Zayn’s looking at. “Oh, you mean the guy I was talking to? No, we said no hooking up, remember?”

“We're not in the van tonight, though.”

“No, but in an 8-bed-dorm,” Niall deadpans. “I wouldn't have done it even if I had my own room. He wasn't my type.”

“He absolutely was. Tall and dark haired is exactly your type when it comes to guys.”

Niall sighs loudly. “Alright, I'll just be going, then. You can come or not.”

Zayn follows him towards the entrance and tries very hard not to think about all the ways in which he isn't Niall's type. At least Niall seems about as willing to talk about hook-ups as he does, so they can safely drop that topic.

They’re quiet walking back towards the hostel until Niall nudges Zayn lightly with his elbow. “Hey,” he murmurs. “I didn’t wanna ruin the night or anything. We good?”

“Yeah, ‘course,” Zayn whispers back and does his best to smile at Niall reassuringly. “I didn’t mean to…pry, or whatever.”

“It’s okay,” Niall says. He’s quiet for a moment and then rushes out: “I didn’t like how direct he was, like there was no way I’d say no. He didn’t even ask if I was seeing anyone.”

“Good thing you got away, then,” Zayn says and then pauses, rewinds what Niall just said. “Wait, you’re not seeing anyone though, right? You didn’t tell me-“

“No, Zayn, I’m not seeing anyone,” Niall sighs, and Zayn wonders if he imagined the sad note to it. “Now hush, we don’t wanna wake up the rest of our dorm.”

*

For a bunk bed, the hostel bed is pretty comfortable and Zayn sleeps through until morning, when someone in the room packs their bag a little too noisily. Niall’s still asleep in the bunk above his and Zayn slips on a hoodie and his shoes and slumps towards the small community kitchen to get them both a glass of water.

Niall is sitting up halfway and blinking at Zayn blearily when he gets back. They’re the only ones left in the dorm and Niall takes the water from Zayn gratefully, gulps it down quickly. “Right, I’ll need a very greasy breakfast and a whole barrel of coffee before I can even think about doing the drive to Bradford,” he croaks and Zayn laughs a little.

“Get ready and I’ll take you out for breakfast,” he promises and grabs his stuff to head for the showers.

He’s already standing under the hot spray when Niall comes in too, putters around in the shower next door and eventually turns on the water with a creak. Zayn tries to keep his mind from thinking about how Niall is naked about five feet away from him and pulls on his hair a bit too harshly while shampooing it. This whole thing has been happening too fast since they’ve embarked on their road trip, he feels like he’s lost his footing and is falling, faster and faster.

Falling for Niall.

How is it possible to be friends with Niall for years and never feel like this until suddenly everything changes for no obvious reason and he feels absolutely helpless in the face of his emotions? How can Niall have smiled at him like this for years and only now does it make him feel weak in the knees?

Zayn gets out of the shower and dresses, relieved their next stop is his parents’ house where they can do their washing. They’ve only been on the road for less than two weeks but there isn’t that much space in the van for actual luggage since their equipment (which includes not only the mattress, microwave and water canisters but also the stupid UFO hunter stuff) takes up way too much space.

Sitting on his bunk, Zayn googles for a breakfast location but all he finds is a Starbucks so that’ll have to do. He packs both their bags while waiting for Niall to finish up and then looks up their route on his phone just to be sure. He’s much improved his abilities of reading maps since the first day, but he’s still more comfortable with GPS.

“Coffee,” Niall groans when he gets back and Zayn looks up from his phone.

“Alright, let’s check out, put our bags in the van and I’ll take you.”

Niall gets an Espresso at Starbucks that he downs while waiting for his second drink, a White Chocolate Mocha that makes Zayn cringe from where he’s standing with his black filter coffee. Niall gets the All Day Breakfast Buttie, a monstrosity of egg, sausage and bacon, and Zayn has a Soft Cheese Bagel. They split a Raspberry Cheesecake Muffin afterwards and Niall gets a third coffee (if a Caramel Macchiato even counts as coffee, this is a frequent argument between the two of them). Then they’re ready to hit the road.

Zayn isn’t sure if he’s imagining the awkwardness between them or if it’s him that’s causing it with his stilted talking and care not to touch Niall at all. He doesn’t fucking know how to deal with this now that he’s noticed his feelings aren’t just friendly. How much touching is usual for them? What’s too affectionate, when will Niall notice?

The weather seems to be in tune with Zayn’s mood because it starts pouring down before they’re even on the A55. Niall’s wearing a hoodie that Zayn could swear was his at some point and no sunglasses today, the corner of his mouth is turned down slightly from what Zayn can see whenever he dares glance sideways. He’s turned up the radio but isn’t singing along to any of the songs, even the ones he knows entirely by heart.

Zayn feels miserable.

They get past Chester until Niall speaks up. “What’s going on, Zayn?” Niall asks, lowering the volume of the radio. “Did I do something I don’t remember or why won’t you look at me?”

“I do look at you,” Zayn protests weakly and it’s especially unconvincing because he won’t take his eyes off the raindrops sliding down his window.

Niall sighs. “Seriously, talk to me. What happened?”

 _I realised I’ve been slowly but surely falling in love with you for God knows how long._ “Nothing. I’m just in one of my moods, dunno. Not enough sleep, bad weather, who knows.”

“You sure?” Niall doesn’t sound convinced. “You know you can talk to me, yeah?”

“Yeah, I know,” Zayn mumbles. “Maybe I should just nap for a bit, if that’s okay?”

“’Course,” Niall says softly and Zayn’s heart aches a little. “I’ll just keep driving towards Manchester and then to Bradford once it’s on the signs, right?”

“Exactly,” Zayn sighs and closes his eyes. He doesn’t think he’ll actually be able to sleep but at least this’ll give him some time to figure out how to proceed.

He gets as far as deciding he somehow needs to continue the same way they’ve always acted, which is pretty affectionate on a regular day, before he falls asleep.

Zayn wakes up when the car slows down and blinks his eyes open to see that it’s still raining and they’ve just entered Bradford. He does actually feel a little better, if still completely blindsided by his feelings. But he’s mostly confident he can keep treating Niall the same way he always has and hopefully get over this quickly.

“Hey,” he mumbles sleepily to Niall who turns to give him a smile. “I know the way from here.”

“Great, direct me,” Niall smiles, then looks at him a bit closer when he has to stop at a red light. “Feeling better?”

Zayn rubs at his eyes and nods. “Lots. I’m also starving.”

“D’you think your mum has leftovers from lunch?”

“There’s never nothing to eat in that house,” Zayn promises. “And especially when she knows we’re coming. I’ll text her we’ll be there in 15 minutes.”

“You know, if you could cook like your mum I’d never let you go,” Niall muses. “Like, I’d force you to live with me for the rest of my life.”

“Who says I can’t cook like my mum?” Zayn pouts, offended.

“If you can, you’ve kept it a secret from me for no reason and that would be even worse.”

“Okay,” Zayn sighs. “I can’t. I could learn, though, I’m sure she’d be happy to teach me.”

Niall shrugs cheerfully. “Prepare to spend your days in my kitchen, then.”

Zayn laughs and desperately hopes no one will ever learn how much that prospect tempts him to get cooking lessons from his mum.

They pull into the Malik’s driveway exactly 12 minutes after Zayn’s texted his mum but they seem to have waited at the door because it opens before Niall has cut the engine, and out spill Zayn’s old and dearly loved dog Harley, his youngest sister Safaa and his mum.

Thankfully, the rain has stopped and Zayn gets out of the van quickly. He kneels down to greet Harley first, scratching the pitbull’s floppy ears and kissing the white blaze on his otherwise dark head. “I missed you, buddy,” he says in his puppy voice that Niall always makes of him for, “I missed you.”

His mum and sister are busy with Niall anyway – he’s pretty sure Safaa has a crush on him and Niall has had Zayn’s mum wrapped around his finger from the day they first met – so Zayn takes his time before he joins the three of them.

His mum hugs him tightly. “Hello, sunshine,” she says and kisses his cheek. “I’m so glad you made it.”

“’Course, mum, been missing you.”

“You must be hungry!” Trisha says and lets go of Zayn. “Come on in, I made plenty of food for you boys.”

Zayn hugs Safaa hello and listens to her tell him about school before he follows his mum and Niall inside. Trisha makes them sit down and serves them so much food that Zayn feels like he might burst just from looking at it but Niall digs in happily, so Zayn follows suit.

They do little that day, Niall makes some phone calls to the archives and libraries they plan to visit over the next days and Zayn marks down the routes on their map but that’s about it. Most of the addresses they got at the archives of the British UFO Research Association were in Wales, they only have two contacts in the Yorkshire area. There have been plenty of “sightings” though, so hopefully local newspapers can be helpful.

The UFO crash site Owen Driscoll told them to visit turns out not to be on their route at all but in Suffolk, near Ipswich. It’s called Rendlesham Forest and sounds really cool, though, and there’s an affordable campsite right where the so called “UFO trail” starts, so they decide to take the detour anyway and make an online reservation for a one night stay. It’s not like they’re on a schedule.

Zayn’s dad gets home from work in the evening, Waliyha gets back from wherever she went after school and his older sister Doniya stops by for dinner so they have a proper nice family dinner (because, as Zayn’s mum keeps saying, “Niall is as good as part of this family”). Afterwards, Zayn helps his mum do the dishes while the others go to the living room already.

“So, sweetheart,” Trisha says once they’re alone. “What’s going on with you and Niall?”

Zayn nearly drops the glass he’s drying and sets it down very carefully. “What do you mean? Nothing.”

“I’m your mother,” she says, voice soft. “I can tell something’s up. You hold yourself back around him and Niall looks at you as if he’s afraid of breaking you. Did something happen?”

“No,” Zayn presses out, bites at the corner of his mouth and tries not to tear up in his mum’s kitchen. “Mum, I just…nothing happened, per se. But I…look, I don’t know how to say this, I only just figured it out myself –“

“You love him.” It’s said matter-of-factly and when Zayn turns to look at his mum, she’s smiling a little.

“What? I, no…I don’t know, I wouldn’t call it that yet –“ He stops. “Alright, yeah, maybe I do. Or I could.” It feels huge to say it out loud, and so small at the same time. Like this isn’t actually news, just something that’s always been there. And maybe it has, he should’ve realised it sooner.

“Oh, sunshine.” His mum dries her hands and then pulls him into a hug. Zayn’s surprised but goes more than willingly, buries his face in his mum’s shoulder and holds on tight. “I’ve been waiting for this to happen, for you to realise.”

“You knew?” Zayn asks, voice muffled. “Since when?”

“A while. There was always something about the two of you.” She’s stroking his hair and Zayn feels like a little boy again. “Now, you can either wait until he realises it himself or you tell him and make him see.”

“What?” Zayn pulls back. “No, mum, I can’t tell him. It’d ruin everything.”

Trisha shakes her head. “It won’t. He feels the same way, trust me. Maybe he just hasn’t realised it yet, or maybe he thinks you haven’t. If you don’t talk about it, you’re just going to miss out on a great thing.”

Zayn considers telling his mum she’s crazy but figures that wouldn’t be a good idea since they want to stay for at least two more days, so he just picks up another plate instead and starts drying again. “I’ll think about it.”

“You better, young man,” Trisha says, combined with her threatening pointer finger and Zayn knows he has to come up with a plan. She’s not going to let this one go easily, he can feel it.

He’s temporarily saved by Doniya who comes to drag them over to the living room so they can start the movie. Zayn gets pushed onto the sofa with his dad, Safaa and Niall, squished between the armrest and his best friend. Niall curls into his side as soon as they turn down the lights and Zayn lets him happily, wraps a loose arm around his shoulders, and that’s how they watch Big Hero 6.

Doniya leaves after the film is over and Zayn’s other sisters head upstairs, so Niall and Zayn stay with Zayn’s parents for a bit longer, telling them about their trip.

“And have you found any traces of aliens yet?” Yaser asks, eyes twinkling with mirth.

Niall laughs and Zayn smiles down at his lap, lets the blond answer. “Not yet. Who knows, maybe we’ll find something in the next few days or we’ll just have to wait until they find us.”

Zayn shows some of the pictures he took and has to scroll through an embarrassing amount of pictures of Niall to get to the selfies, sights and landscapes he knows he photographed. He’s really been a bit obtuse, if he thinks about it now.

Soon after, the two of them head up to Zayn’s childhood bedroom that’s still exactly the way he left it before uni, including the stacks of comic books and action figures he left behind because he wanted to seem at least a bit cooler than he is.

Niall’s been here before though and knows exactly how uncool Zayn really is, so he doesn’t even react, just flops down on Zayn’s bed. “I’m never going to move again.”

“You say that now,” Zayn grins, “but I know how much you’d miss that van of yours.”

“Mostly because of the awesome glow-in-the-dark-stars,” Niall agrees. “They really upgraded it.”

“And we haven’t even gotten to appreciate them at night yet,” Zayn says. “At least when they’re actually glowing.”

Niall sits up. “You’re right! I can’t believe we haven’t, that’ll make the thought of another night on that damn mattress a lot more appealing.”

“Glad to help,” Zayn laughs, then heads to the bathroom to get ready for bed. He brushes his teeth and washes his face, then steals some of his dad’s nice face cream. All he took on this road trip are the cheap miniature packs he stole from hotels or got as a sample at _Boots_.

He has to shake Niall awake again when he gets back to his room, he’s fallen asleep on top of the comforter. “Five more minutes,” Niall groans.

“You’re gonna get cold like that,” Zayn says, unrelenting. “Besides, sleeping in your jeans is bloody uncomfortable _and_ you should brush your teeth because I’ll have to wake up to your morning breath tomorrow.”

“You suck,” Niall gripes but he does get up and shuffles out the door.

Zayn undresses and climbs into bed in just his boxers, takes his usual side of the bed and closes his eyes. It’s always nice to be back home and it’s even nicer when Niall’s there with him, getting along with his family so well. He doesn’t want to lose this, any of it, so he can’t tell Niall. He’ll scare him off.

Niall slides under the covers next to him, bullies one of his cold feet in between Zayn’s and slings an arm around his waist like it’s the most natural thing in the world. It feels like it is.

“G’night, Zaynie,” Niall mumbles, breath warm against Zayn’s shoulder.

Zayn suppresses a shudder and reaches out to flick off the light. “Goodnight.”

*

It's nice to be heading out with a full belly and a stuffed lunch box each for once, and Zayn feels much more cheerful than on their regular mornings. This, of course, could also be because he finally got to have a wank again in the shower this morning, one where he very deliberately did not think about Niall.

“Well aren't you chipper this morning,” Niall observes when Zayn turns up the volume of the radio. “What's up?”

“Nothing,” Zayn says innocently. “Just glad to escape the van for a couple of nights, I guess? We've spent more than enough time in this thing as it is.”

“Good thing we aren't in America, then. We've been around all of Wales without driving more than, say, six hours a day. You wouldn't get anywhere like this in America.”

“We should do that next,” Zayn says on a whim. “A road trip across America. I bet they have lots of UFO stuff, too.”

“Did you know there's a town in New Mexico that does, like, UFO tourism?” Niall asks. “A UFO crashed there in the 40s and they have, like, a UFO museum and everything.”

“Is that the one with the green alien statues everywhere and, like, alien shaped street lamps?” Zayn wants to know. “I saw that on telly once.”

“That's the one,” Niall laughs. “Roswell, New Mexico.”

“Crazy,” Zayn shakes his head. “They've all gone round the bend, if you ask me.”

“I'd like to see it, I think. Just to imagine being an actual alien and seeing what humankind imagines them like.”

Zayn laughs incredulously. “I can't believe you. But if I ever win the lottery, that's the first place I'll take you.”

“Aw, Zaynie,” Niall says, presses a hand to his chest and flutters his eyelashes at Zayn. He’s taking the piss but to Zayn, he’s unbearably cute. “I’m honoured.”

“Shame I never buy lottery tickets,” Zayn jokes, ignoring the flutter in his tummy. “You’ll have to pay instead.”

“Fuck you,” Niall laughs. “But just for the record, if I ever were to do another road trip, no matter where, I’d take you. You’ve been a good companion.”

“ _Companion_?” Zayn repeats. “Like we’re on Doctor Who and you’re the Doctor? Which would make me the pretty girl who travels with you…”

“Well, you’ve got the pretty part down pat,” Niall grins. “Grow out your hair, maybe, I think they all had long hair.”

“You’re so full of shit,” Zayn laughs. “I’m not your companion, you dick.”

“Well not for much longer if you keep insulting me.”

“Turn left here,” Zayn says, and then, “See, you need me.”

“I would’ve managed to find Bradford Central Library without your help, thank you very much,” Niall insists but does as Zayn told him. They find a parking space in front of the library, a big grey building with 8 stories, the entire front side taken up by windows.

“I’m gonna be honest and admit I didn’t expect a building this big,” Niall says as they get out of the car. “Although maybe I should’ve, I knew they had both the library and the archive here.”

Inside, they go to the reception desk after finding the sign post less than helpful. “Oh, yes,” the receptionist says after Niall has explained what they’re looking for. “Head on up to the second floor. Have you got your CARN reader’s tickets?”

“No, what’s that?” Zayn asks. He used to have a library card here, but he doubts that’s still valid.

“It’s the ticket needed for access to any of the archives belonging to the County Archive Research Network,” she explains. “We’re part of the West Yorkshire Archives Service that’s a member of CARN. The point is to ensure we have up to date information about our visitors and provide more security for our documents. If you don’t have tickets, you’ll need to show me a valid ID with your name, permanent address and signature on it and then sign the Visitor’s Book.”

Zayn and Niall do as they’re told, then take the stairs up to the second floor with the temporary ticket the receptionist printed out for them. It’s valid for the day, so they’ll have to take it to their next stop in Leeds as well, since their archive belongs to the West Yorkshire Archives Service as well. Another woman greets them on the second floor and they have to hand her their tickets and leave their jackets in the lockers before being allowed to enter the archive.

It takes up the whole second floor, rows after rows of bookshelves filled with boxes and folders. It looks a lot more clinical than the pretty UFO research archive in Cardiff, but Niall and Zayn won’t need most of these documents. The biggest parts of these local archives are made up of town history and documents about the people who lived here, catered to people researching their family history. Niall’s done his research, though, and found out they often have a section titled “Natural Disasters & Unusual Occurrences” which Zayn thinks is an absolutely stupid name, but that’s where they’re most likely to find anything.

“This section is mostly strange weather phenomena when you look at the older records,” Niall says, brushing his hand along the backside of a couple of folders, “but if you look at the more recent ones, they’re mostly inexplicable things people vow to have seen.”

“Most of which can probably be explained as strange weather phenomena as well,” Zayn mutters, but places his writing pad and pencil on the table nearby anyway. As usual, they only check the most recent records to narrow down their search and because Niall says if they want to actually find anything – visible or measurable by their EMF metre – it needs to have happened at least moderately recent.

They don’t stay very long, most of the things they find aren’t very useful – plenty of beams of lights, disc shaped objects and the likes – so they leave with only a few notes each.

“This one’s on the way to Leeds anyway,” Zayn says, looking over what Niall’s written down. “We can just get off the M62, I know where that is. And that person really said a UFO landed in their field?”

“Yep,” Niall nods, then grins cheekily. “It was in the newspaper, it must be true.”

The drive from Bradford to Leeds usually takes less than half an hour but they pull off the road about halfway through, Zayn guiding Niall through a tiny village to a narrow track in between fields. “This must be it.”

They take their equipment out with practiced ease, but as usual, the EMF metre doesn’t show anything unusual. It never does.

“Well then, onwards,” Niall sighs. “We’ll be in Leeds right in time to eat your mum’s food.”

The archive in Leeds is a much smaller red brick building with a new building made primarily from glass right next to it. The car park is tiny but Niall parks his van in the last available spot and the two of them sit down in the shadow of a tree nearby to have their lunch.

Niall’s made them an appointment for 1.30pm and the staff will already have picked out relevant sources which is good because they plan to make it to the archive in York before it closes at 5pm and it’s another 40 minute drive to get there.

The Leeds branch of West Yorkshire Archives Service is about as helpful as the Bradford one, so Zayn just jots down a couple of locations they can maybe check out and find nothing at while he absently listens to Niall argue with the woman showing them around about how difficult it would be to get the name and address of a source off a newspaper journalist.

“I’m sorry, Mr Horan,” she’s saying for what must be the hundredth time. “We have very strict rules when it comes to privacy, and I’m certain it’s the same for journalists. Unless you can give a valid reason why it’s vital you find this person, no one is going to give you the information you want.”

When they leave just before 3pm, she doesn’t even wish them good luck on their search. Zayn laughs and nudges Niall with his elbow on their way out. “You annoyed her so much, I thought she was gonna clock you round the head at one point.”

“Look, the plan was to annoy her so long she tells me what I want to know just to get me to shut up,” Niall explains.

“That always works for Harry,” they both say at the same time and Niall laughs.

“See? You get me. No idea why it didn’t work.”

The archive in York would be of no use to them since the documents are currently being reprocessed and made available online, which means most of them aren’t available at the actual archive. Thankfully, however, they’re only looking for records from the very recent past, which have already been collected in digital form anyway. This makes the search a lot easier for Niall and Zayn because they can just search for keywords. The amount of results is almost frustratingly small, and they get more locations but no further information. At least this helps them plan their route for tomorrow, and the way back to Bradford.

They walk around York for a bit afterwards because neither of them feels like sitting down again and it’s quite a nice day, overcast but warm enough to walk around in jeans and a light jacket. Niall’s wearing a denim jacket over a striped t-shirt and skinny jeans, he calls it “double denim” and Zayn would’ve said it’s a no-go, but Niall somehow makes it work.

Zayn’s trusty leather jacket is perfect for the weather and the beautiful Edwardian brick building the archive is situated in is pretty central, so they check out the park behind the Yorkshire Museum, cross the river Ouse to get to the York Council building with the round tower and later on, on the other side of the Ouse again, Clifford’s Tower. They pass the Grand Opera House and York Dungeon on their way back to the car and take selfies in front of every sight they can find.

They’re back in Bradford in time for a late dinner because, as expected, they didn’t find anything interesting at any of the locations they stopped at. Still, it’s been a good day and Zayn’s in a fantastic mood during dinner. He likes the days where they’re basically just tourists best anyway.

His mum keeps giving him expecting glances as if she thinks he’ll announce something, probably that Niall feels the same way. Which he doesn’t so Zayn’s not even gonna ask. He shakes his head as subtly as possible but when it happens for the third time, Niall looks over at him questioningly. Zayn really doesn’t feel like explaining – what would he even say? – so he just shakes his head at Niall as well and hopes he’ll have forgotten about it by the time they’re alone.

Later in bed, Niall doesn’t hesitate to spoon Zayn again and Zayn thinks that this is another thing that hasn’t been happening before their road trip. Sure, they’ve shared beds before, they’ve cuddled while watching movies and Zayn’s woken up to Niall draped all across him, but a whole night of intentional spooning? That started with the minimal space in the van. And the fact that Niall does it out of the van too, now, when Zayn’s bed would be big enough to have over a foot of space between them – Zayn isn’t gonna complain.

*

“Rise and shine, sleepyhead,” a soft voice pulls Zayn away from his dreams and he sleepily blinks his eyes open. “We need to get on the road, petal,” Niall is saying. He’s already dressed, kneeling on the bed next to Zayn and shaking him carefully. Maybe he’s stroking Zayn’s shoulder, he can’t really tell right now.

“Hrmpf,” Zayn makes and Niall giggles, leans forward to press a kiss to Zayn’s temple.

“I’ll make breakfast and pack us some lunch but I expect you downstairs in 15 minutes tops, yeah?”

Zayn groans again but shifts a little to signal that’s he’s understood and Niall climbs off the bed, annoyingly cheerful already, and leaves Zayn’s room.

Zayn wakes up slightly under the shower, frowns slightly and replays what’s just happened. Niall called him “petal”, Niall kissed his temple. _Niall called him “petal”_. Yes, Niall likes pet names and yes, he’s called Zayn and the other boys “babe” on occasion, but _petal_? That’s not something he’s ever heard Niall use outside of a relationship.

His brain is probably overanalysing again, but Zayn can feel his heartbeat picking up. What if his mum is right? What if there _is_ something there from Niall’s side, too? Maybe he should stop saying there isn’t and look for signs instead. Zayn tips his head back, water beating down on him. He doesn’t want to get his hopes up, but maybe it’s time to figure out what he wants.

Niall is in the kitchen with Trisha when Zayn comes down and hands him a cup of coffee with a smile. “We’re taking tea with us but you need coffee to wake up,” he says, and Zayn accepts it gratefully.

“Morning, mum,” he says and kisses her cheek.

“Good morning, sunshine,” she smiles and pushes a couple of boxes Niall’s way. “That’s your lunch, boys, or whenever you want to eat it. Do you need anything else? The thermos is over there.”

“Thanks, Trish,” Niall grins. “I’ll put ‘em in the van.”

“Mum,” Zayn says as soon as Niall’s out of earshot, “what makes you think Niall…um, feels the same way about me?”

She smiles softly. “Have you noticed it, then? It’s in everything he does, the way he looks at you, touches you, talks about you. It’s obvious, really, I just think the two of you are a bit oblivious.”

“I’ve just been wondering,” Zayn shrugs, face hot. “Dunno, if maybe it’s not as hopeless as I first thought it was.”

“I don’t think it’s hopeless at all, sunshine,” Trisha says. “But I understand that you want to be sure before you act on it, considering how much it’s gonna change. Just believe me when I say that I have all the confidence when it comes to you and Niall.”

Niall’s back before Zayn can figure out how to react to that and they leave a few minutes later.

He’s quiet in the car, trying to think of all the things that Niall does that might be more than platonic, but he can’t figure out what’s just Niall. He’s affectionate with all of his friends, always up for a hug or a cuddle, pretty much the opposite of a “no homo” dude.

Now, the pet names – that might just be Zayn. Only, how can Zayn find out if Niall asked him to go on this UFO hunting trip because he wants to call him pet names or if he calls him pet names because they’ve gotten even closer during this adventure?

“Please tell me you aren’t in a bad mood today,” Niall eventually breaks the quiet. “The weather’s supposed to be nice-ish and we’re going to the seaside again, c’mon Zayn!”

“I’m not, I’m not,” Zayn says and vows to snap out of it. There’s plenty of time to figure all this out. “Still waking up, is all.”

“You choose the music, then,” Niall offers. “Or the radio station, like.”

Zayn laughs and leans forward to press and turn on the buttons carefully. He’s always scared he’ll break it, but he manages to find a station that plays decent music, none of Niall’s Top 40 shit. Their tastes meet in the middle for some Indie rock things, but that’s about as much common ground as they have when it comes to taste in music. Niall’s much more tolerant than Zayn is, though, he has to admit.

They pass Leeds and eventually York on the same road they took yesterday, but they stay on the A64 until they reach North York Moors National Park which is very, very green and a little bit creepy. “It’s like one of these fairy tale forests where witches and wolves wait behind every corner,” Niall says.

The longer they drive, the further up they get, and the views get more and more stunning. “Now I feel like in Harry Potter,” Zayn says at one point and shows Niall a train that does look suspiciously like the Hogwarts Express driving through the woods and across a bridge. They turn down the music for a bit to sing the Harry Potter theme which always turns into a bit of a competition with them and then argue for a while about why this region is called “Moors” when all they see are forests – until they escape the latest forest and see nothing but moorland.

Zayn has pulled up the official North York Moors National Park website on his phone and reads out loud: “ _Heather moorland is rare on a worldwide scale – there is probably less heather moorland in the world than tropical rainforest. Around 70 percent of the world's heather moorland is in the UK and the largest continuous expanse of moorland in England and Wales is here in the North York Moors – a sheep could wander from Egton to Bilsdale without leaving the moor. Moorland covers a third of the North York Moors National Park and most of the higher ground is covered in heather._ No idea where Egton and Bilsdale are, but you see why we drove through so many forests. Only a third of this is even moorland.”

“I think we’re very close to Egton, actually,” Niall says and then points at a sign coming up. “Look, there! If we took this exit we’d get there.”

“Please follow the A169 for 2 kilometres,” Zayn says in what he hopes is a GPS voice. “Until you reach Guisborough Road.”

“Do you know our route by heart?” Niall laughs. “Or how do you know which road to take after this?”

“Dunno, just remembered that one,” Zayn shrugs. “It’s the A171 and we’re almost there.”

“Consider me impressed.”

Modestly, Zayn just shrugs. “I know a lot more about Whitby, just you wait and see.”

“Don't make me so curious!” Niall exclaims. “All I know is that this is a small harbour town with mostly tourism as their economy because they're so isolated.”

“Focus on finding a parking spot,” Zayn laughs. “I'll tell you all you need to know.”

For a small town, Whitby has plenty of car parks and they're still sort of early so it doesn't take Niall too long to park his van. They're pretty central already so Zayn offers to give Niall a quick tour before they find their contact.

“Have you even been here before?” Niall asks incredulously.

“Well, once,” Zayn admits. “As a kid, my mum and dad took us on a short holiday here.”

“In that green van you told me about? This must feel like déjà-vu to you!” Niall quickly schools his features into something disapproving again. “You're still a show off.”

Zayn grins. “Maybe. But look over there,” he points towards a huge light yellow building with hundreds of windows, “that's the Royal Hotel. And that statue in front of it? That's Captain James Cook, the explorer. He did his apprenticeship as a merchant navy apprentice here, and it's said the ships he went on his travels with were built here as well.”

“Okay,” Niall says, “how on Earth do you know that?”

“We went to the Cook Memorial Museum on our holiday. I was young and very impressed by a man travelling the world, and a mostly unknown one at that, by ship.”

“And look at you now,” Niall coos teasingly. “Exploring Great Britain in search for alien life.”

“Shut up,” Zayn laughs. “You seriously need to take me to America because I've still not seen the world.”

“Well, I better start saving now, then,” Niall grins and hooks an arm through Zayn's. “Now come on, tell me more about this town.”

They walk past the Old Town Hall with its sandstone pillars down to the harbour. It's a bit windy but not too cold to walk down one of the piers until they reach the lighthouse on this one with a great view of the other pier with its own lighthouse.

Zayn directs Niall until he can take a picture of him with his hands stretched so it looks as if he's holding the lighthouses apart with sheer strength alone. His blond hair is messy and the sun comes out exactly at the right time to make it look like it's glowing, almost as bright as Niall's smile. The sleeves of his navy blue long sleeve are pushed up to his elbow, the collar pulled low by the sunglasses he's hung from it. Zayn's pretty sure it's the best picture he's ever taken.

They take a selfie with the Dracula figure outside the Dracula museum and Zayn explains that parts of Bram Stokers novel are set in Whitby. He gives Niall a list of some other famous writers who've stayed and/or set their novels here - Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, Elizabeth Gaskell, Lewis Carroll - just to prove he's still an English student even after graduation and then they look up the address they're heading for again.

“Oh, I have seen several things,” Rose Hawthorne tells them at her front door after they’ve introduced themselves. She stuffs her keys into the front pocket of her old-fashioned apron and pulls it close behind her. She’s a lady at least in her 60s, with curly grey hair and big glasses, not the fashionable kind that Niall owns. “One night while I was walking my dog Buster, may he rest in peace, I saw a triangle of lights in the sky over Whitby.” She takes a few more steps outside and points to the sky. “First, it was hovering for a while, then it started heading towards the sea, always in formation. It wasn’t a plane, I’m telling you. Then there was that time I saw a beam of light come down from a cloud. It was blue in colour, and there was no lightning anywhere else. Another time, I saw a huge silver ball over the A171. Now, I’ve never seen an aircraft like that either.”

Zayn nods seriously, long since having learned to just act as if they believe whatever the people they talk to are saying.

“Then, at Robin Hood’s Bay, where my friend used to live,” Miss Hawthorne continues, and Niall throws Zayn a wide-eyed look, scribbles something down in his notebook, “It was just after New Year’s and I saw these silver stars, they looked nothing like regular stars, you see? I saw them head north, at least 15 of them. Actually, maybe you should head down there, everything I saw was either heading towards Robin Hood’s Bay or was right above it.”

She seems unwilling to ask them inside anyway, so Niall and Zayn leave soon after, and as soon as the door closes behind her, Niall grips Zayn’s arm. “There’s a place called Robin Hood’s Bay here and you didn’t tell me? We need to go there, Zayn!”

“Relax, it’s not even confirmed Robin Hood actually came anywhere near here,” Zayn says. “But I think it’s a pretty village so sure, let’s go. It shouldn’t be too far away.”

In fact, the little fisher village is only a ten minute drive away – enough for them to make quite the dent into the food they brought from home – and absolutely worth the visit, even though they completely forget to check for anything UFO related. The narrow streets and cobblestone pathways are like the definition of picturesque, and the sun even comes out while they take a stroll around the tiny harbour. It’s more of a stony beach, actually, the boats resting on the ground or a bit further out, gently rocking on the waves. They’re not the only tourists and ask a young couple to take their picture after they’ve taken one of them and Zayn immediately posts it on Instagram.

It’s a great shot, the harbour with colourful boats and a couple of small houses visible in the background. Niall and Zayn are both wearing sunglasses, Zayn’s arm around Niall’s shoulder and Niall’s elbow on Zayn’s shoulder, making the peace sign not quite behind his head. They look happy and relaxed and Niall comments a row of heart eyed emojis right away.

“Everyone’s gonna look at your Instagram wondering why you took a road trip with that weird pasty boy,” Niall grins. “All your recent pictures are of me.”

“Well,” Zayn says and dares pressing a kiss to Niall’s cheek, “I like having you all over my Instagram. And I’m all over yours, anyway.”

“Yeah, but you’re pretty,” Niall says cheekily and Zayn pinches his side.

“Shut up and stop fishing for compliments, you know how handsome you are. And now come on, I know just what we need right now.”

They get ice cream at a tiny shop by the harbour and sit on a low wall with their feet dangling just above the water to eat it before they head back to the car.

The drive to Filey, where the very last contact on their list from Cardiff lives, takes them 45 minutes. It’s another small coastal town, very pretty and tourist-y with its clean white houses and long beach, hotels and neat parks.

“Oh, look, they have a golf course here!” Niall exclaims when they pass a sign for the Filey Golf Club. “You still have to come golfing with me at some point.”

“I really don’t, Niall,” Zayn says. “I leave you alone about this weird hobby of yours but I won’t join you, no way. You’ve got Harry for that.”

“But what if I like you better?”

“What are you talking about? You love Harry.”

Niall sighs. “True, I really do. I miss him, and the others. But still, you know I love you the most, yeah?”

Zayn looks over at where Niall’s intently focused on the road, his cheeks traitorously pink, and bites his lip. _What if?_ “Love you the most, too,” he says quietly, heart beating fast.

“Oh, look! There we are.” Niall’s out of the car quicker than ever and Zayn allows himself a few deep breaths. That’s a good sign, right? Niall loves him the most but doesn’t want to go into detail, that’s gotta mean something.

With a smile, Zayn follows Niall to the door of the house they’ve stopped in front of. Niall’s already talking to a man there, probably in his late 50s and wearing a truly awful button down shirt with UFOs and planets on it. Zayn can already tell he’s one of the really convinced ones.

“You must be Zayn, then!” the man exclaims, stretching a hand out towards Zayn who shakes it. “I’m Russ Kellett, UFO investigator.”

This one asks Niall and Zayn in and starts by telling them about how he’s been doing this for over twenty years now, that he collaborates with professionals in different fields – photographers, experts in soil and plant analysis and forensic analysists, as well as other UFO investigators – to make sure the things he reports on are scientifically proving. He then continues by telling them how he once spotted what looked like a big dolphin hovering in the sky above Filey. “The object seemed to be the size of a large car, then it started elevating quickly. I zoomed in on it with my camera and I could not believe my eyes. The object looked like a dolphin! At first I thought it was a balloon but it was too big, as it was the festival I thought it might be some kind of advertising. It was unlikely it was a toy balloon it was too big, and you would not let it fly away because of the expense, would you? It stayed in the same place for more than two hours and I over the next few weeks, I kept asking around if it was some form of advertising, but no one knew anything.”

The dolphin is new, that much Zayn has to admit. Still, whenever he hears someone talk about this kind of thing so reverently, he has a hard time to keep from laughing. Russ has more stories of the kind; white glowing oblong objects hovering in the air, saucers, an unidentified object that couldn’t be captured on film because the camera kept turning itself off for no reason.

“I can show you a place where my friends and I often keep watch,” he says. “It’s halfway between Filey and Bridlington and if you want, I would invite you to the pub in Bridlington afterwards. They have nicer ones down there than they do here.”

It’s mostly the prospect of a free meal that makes Zayn and Niall agree, but they get into their car to follow Russ in his anyway. The spot he shows them isn’t spectacular at all, a remote hill off the A165 on the 15 minute drive to Bridlington.

Bridlington is the biggest town they’ve been to today but still rather small, Russ shows them around the city centre and the nice harbour before he leads them to a pub that’s not as crowded as the ones in the more tourist-y areas seem to have been.

It’s a pretty nice evening, actually, Russ might be a little crazy but he has plenty of entertaining stories and knows how to tell them, at one point Zayn actually snorts his beer and ends up coughing so hard Niall has to slap him on the back.

They leave around 7.30 pm with the promise to call Russ first thing if they find anything, and head back to Bradford. They’re both in a great mood and Zayn lets Niall turn up his Top 40 music and even sings along sometimes. Maybe he even dances a little in his seat when they play the Backstreet Boys, but Niall dances more so it’s okay.

Shortly after 9 pm, they’re back in Bradford and spend the next few hours with Zayn’s family before everyone goes to bed. It’s their last night with them, tomorrow Zayn and Niall will head back down south, towards Rendlesham Forest, their last stop before London. Niall recounts the stories they heard and makes Zayn’s sisters cry with laughter, Zayn just sits back and feels happy.

*

It's one of their longest drives in one piece but they arrive at Forest Camping after a little over four hours just in time for lunch the next day. The name makes sense as they're now in the middle of a huge forest on the east coast of England. It's the light sort, with bright greens and the sun shining through the branches of the trees, painting patterns onto the ground. Niall stops at the entrance of the camp site, located right in the middle of Rendlesham Forest, and shows their reservation slip. They have to pay £20 for their assigned spot where they park the van.

There's a picnic table right next to it that they immediately make use of to have their lunch. “No extra fee for electricity,” Niall reads from the leaflet they got at reception. “And 50p charge per shower. Rent bikes to explore the forest further and hike the UFO trail or one of the other scenic routes.”

“This is a family location, isn’t it?” Zayn asks, looking around them at the big caravans and children running around, kid’s bikes and toys everywhere.

Niall laughs quietly and turns the leaflet around to show Zayn the double page spread on “Activities with Kids”. “Oh well, I don’t think they’ll bother us too much,” he says. “We’ll mostly be here when they’re asleep anyway, and we don’t have any weed left or much beer, so I don’t think we’ll bother them either.”

Zayn laughs. “You’ve got a real point there. So how about we check out that UFO trail now?”

“Definitely,” Niall grins and starts collecting their rubbish. “I’ll just grab my backpack and take us some snacks and drinks, yeah? And the camera, of course.”

They have to walk for a few minutes to get to the start of the UFO trail, complete with a car park and a gate they have to pass. There’s an office there and staff hands them a leaflet with more maps and some information on the UFO trail. It’s straight into the deep forest from there on, following silver arrows from information board to information board. They’re clearly made for children but Zayn and Niall are delighted anyway, every sign looks like a classified folder with some documents peeking out. On each one there’s more information on the “Rendlesham Forest Incident” from December 26 1980.

The first sighting occurred between the RAF bases at Woodbridge and Bentwaters, in the middle of Rendlesham Forest. Security men from both bases spotted a strange aircraft with a bright light that moved away from them as they approached it. They followed it through the forest and eventually lost it. Days later, the lights appeared again and the craft seemingly crashed or landed next to a farmhouse. The men involved claim they were threatened and forced to sign nondisclosure agreements by officials.

There’s quotes and all sorts of statistics about the Incident and UFOs in general, and the walk itself is mostly quiet – it almost feels as if they’re the only ones on the trail – and very pretty. They pass plenty of playgrounds and signs encouraging children to build dens, sometimes families taking a break at one of the playgrounds.

The atmosphere is great and the signs are probably meant to encourage kids to imagine what that night must’ve been like, but it works for Niall and Zayn as well. The funny path markers in the shape of an alien’s head make it easy to head from one point of interest to the next, through the forest and sometimes along the intimidating fences of the RAF bases.

Niall makes Zayn stop to sit on a fallen tree after a bit over an hour. “We need to have this cake your mum packed us,” he explains and gets the box out from his backpack. “Also, it’s sunny here and I want to enjoy some of it instead of hiding in the shadows between the trees.”

“I mean, I definitely won’t say no to cake,” Zayn grins. “Think this trail is worth the detour so far?”

“Yeah, I mean technically, it’s nothing special,” Niall says hesitantly. “But I really like how it’s done, it’s quiet and pretty here and it’s interesting to read up on it a bit, I guess. It’s fun imagining everything, they did a great job with that. Plus it said in the leaflet this place is great for stargazing so maybe we can take the telescope and a blanket away from the campsite tonight and try it?”

“Yeah, ‘course. Haven’t stargazed since Wales and there’s absolutely nothing here to cause light pollution.”

Niall grins at him and then slides his sunglasses down from where they’ve been resting on top of his head, leans his head back to soak up the sun. Zayn can’t seem to look away, eyes sliding from the straight slope of Niall’s nose to his chin dimple and the curve of his throat, the freckles there. He’s wearing a grey t-shirt with a low collar that should be outlawed, his chest hair clearly visible. Zayn wants to touch so badly his fingers actually tingle. He doesn’t think another person has ever made him feel the way Niall does, so stupid yet perfectly happy. He knows he can be entirely himself around his best friend and that Niall is the one person who can make him smile no matter what.

Niall is the person he goes to first with everything, Niall always listens and remembers every little thing, makes him speak up and believes in him, makes him want to follow his dreams. Niall’s the one who said it was alright if he wanted to keep going to uni after he got his degree in English and Art, so now Zayn’s gonna start a master’s program this autumn to become a teacher eventually.

He’s really in love with Niall, and it probably isn’t as sudden as it’s hit him.

Slowly, he slides closer until he can rest his head against Niall’s shoulder, closes his eyes and smiles when Niall lifts a lazy arm to wrap around Zayn’s shoulder. They sit like that quietly for a few minutes before they dig into their cake. Zayn stays close deliberately and their shoulders and arms keep knocking together but Niall doesn’t move either.

The rest of the trail takes them not even 30 minutes, and then they’re stood on the clearing where the UFO was allegedly spotted. A model sits in the middle, depicting the UFO the way it was described by the men who spotted it almost 40 years ago. It’s made from some sort of dark metal, the shape not too far from the classic saucer but more streamlined, with strange symbols on the sides.

“Think aliens are small enough they’d fit in there?” Zayn asks Niall, who laughs.

“Remember what it said on that one sign, about the rumours that “figures with domed heads exited the aircraft”? I feel like all that plays into the little green men cliché.”

They still climb on top of it and have the young father of a family that arrives soon after them take a picture that goes straight on Niall’s Instagram.

“Harry’s commented “come back home already” with at least six exclamation points,” Niall tells Zayn when they head back towards the parking lot that’s right around the corner. The trail’s lead them in a circle.

“Well, we are,” Zayn says. “He’ll be happy about that, I suppose.”

“It’ll be weird being home, don’t you reckon?” Niall asks quietly. “Dunno, feels like it’s been ages.”

“Yeah,” Zayn agrees just as quietly. He dares reaching for Niall’s hand and thinks Niall smiles at the ground before he entwines their fingers. They don’t talk about it, but neither of them lets go until the reach the camp site.

After dinner that night, they pack Niall’s telescope and star charts, a picnic blanket, their last cans of beer, a thermos with tea, a warm jumper each and their torches. It’s dusk when they set out to a clearing they found on the way back from the UFO trail earlier but Zayn already has to use his torch for light so Niall can set the telescope up when they arrive. He turns it off as quickly as possible so their eyes can adjust to the darkness.

It’s not entirely dark yet but will be pitch black in the forest once the sun is down and the moon is small enough not to cause any visibility problems, pretty much a perfect night for stargazing.

“If we’re lucky,” Niall says, bent over the eyepiece of his telescope, “we’ll even be able to see all eight planets tonight. Look! There’s the zodiacal light.”

He lets Zayn look through the telescope to watch the glow of the zodiacal light in the western sky until it disappears. It’s completely dark by the time it’s gone, since zodiacal light is only visible right after sundown, and Niall gets back to work, tracking down a satellite first. He fixes his telescope onto a star cluster next and then manages to find all eight planets, always letting Zayn look through as soon as he’s found what he’s looking for.

He’s an absolute professional and Zayn’s always liked that, watching Niall do what he’s good at, be it anything to do with his IT degree, the great accents he does or stargazing. He never had more than a superficial interest in space before he met Niall, but he could listen to Niall talk about it for hours on end.

Looking through the telescope gets uncomfortable after a while so they sit down on the blanket they brought to have their beer and sandwiches before it gets too cold for cool drinks.

“I’ll try and locate Andromeda Galaxy next,” Niall announces. “It’s a bit early in the year maybe, but I think I’ll find it since we have a telescope and not just binoculars.”

“Which one’s that again?” Zayn asks. Another good thing about Niall is that he’ll never laugh at someone who knows less than him.

“It’s also called the Great Spiral Galaxy, located between Cassiopeia – that’s the giant “W”, remember? – and Pegasus. Technically, it can be seen with the bare eye but it’s not more than a blurry patch of light then.”

“Think you showed me that when we were in Ireland, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, I did.” Zayn can hear Niall’s smile even though it’s too dark to see, he can only see his silhouette as he lies down on the blanket next to Zayn. Their shoulders are pressed close and Zayn knows that he would only have to move his hand a little bit to his left to take Niall’s hand.

He turns his head just enough to see Niall looking up at the sky, and this close up he can see his face perfectly fine, his eyes and teeth lighter than the rest. “Look up,” he’s saying and points up at the sky. “Do you see Ursa Major there? And that’s Pegasus over there, that’s where I’ll look for Andromeda later. These two very bright stars over there, they make up the shoulder and knee of Orion. And of course my favourite – the Ram, or Aries. We can’t see all of its stars without a telescope but you know why I love it anyway.”

Zayn laughs quietly. “Derby. What else?”

“Yeh, the Rams,” Niall laughs. “I’ll show you the whole thing through the telescope later.”

Zayn doesn’t say anything, he’s watching Niall from the side, eyes sparkling along with the stars, a small dimple in his cheek caused by his smile. It’s this exact moment that makes Zayn decide he has to tell him. He can’t stay quiet any longer, he needs to take the risk and tell Niall how he feels, there’s no other way.

“Niall,” he starts and then pauses. How can he do this?

“Hm?” Niall hums softly.

“Listen, I…there’s something I wanted to tell you.” Nervously, Zayn sits back up and wipes his palms on his jeans. “Look, recently I’ve started to see some things a little differently, or maybe it’s just that I never realised it before. And you don’t have to say anything, I don’t wanna, like, ruin things –“

Niall sits up very abruptly, too, startling Zayn. “Don’t – you’re not…that is, if you’re going where I think you are with this, you’re not gonna ruin anything.”

Zayn is quiet for a moment. “What? Wait, can we stop the vague shit for a minute? I wanted to tell you that I, um, that I like you. Like, not just as my best friend.”

Niall laughs and sounds giddy in the dark night, his knee knocking against Zayn’s. “Good. That’s…that’s great, cause…so do I. Fuck, Zayn, I didn’t know how to say cause I guess it just happened over time? Like, I couldn’t really tell anymore if we were this close because of how I felt or if I only felt like this because of how close we are, you know?”

“Yeah,” Zayn lets out a relieved breath, “yeah, exactly. But…you’re sure, now?”

“Absolutely.” Niall’s voice is soft but sounds sure, and Zayn bites his lower lip. His chest feels like it’s expanding, maybe.

“Cool. Yeah…me, too.”

They’re quiet for a minute and then both start laughing almost at the same time.

“Wait, this is so awkward,” Niall giggles. “It’s so fucking dark, I can’t even see you.”

Zayn snorts and places a hand on Niall’s jiggling knee. “Right? I can only tell where you are from your movements.”

“Shut up, I’m nervous,” Niall tries to laugh it off, but it’s still an admission and they both sober up quickly.

“Me too,” Zayn admits. “Like, is this gonna change anything?”

“Well, I hope it’s gonna change an appropriate amount,” Niall jokes but then slides closer on the blanket so both of their knees are touching. “But I know what you mean, and it doesn’t to me. Like, you’re still my favourite person in the universe. Just…just one I’d like to kiss sometimes, maybe?”

He reaches out in the dark and places a hand on Zayn’s cheek, stubbly with his beard. Zayn can feel his fingers shake and places his own hand on top so Niall will know he’s shaking too. “I’d like that very much.”

It’s still too dark to see much so they’re off centre, Zayn catches the corner of Niall’s mouth with his and they’re moving a bit too fast so their chins knock against each other, making them pull back with a laugh.

“Well, that’s improvable,” Niall laughs and then he’s up on his knees, towering over Zayn, grabs his face in both hands and finds his lips perfectly this time.

Zayn makes a surprised sound but he’s pleased, more than, and lets his instincts take over. This is Niall, his best friend, but it’s also a boy he really likes and has been wanting to kiss for a while, so he places his hands on Niall’s waist and kisses him back.

“Much better,” he breathes when Niall pulls back and the blond laughs against his lips, kisses him another time. Zayn‘s pretty sure he can taste Niall’s laugh and it’s the best thing he’s ever tasted.

“Right,” Niall says eventually and sits back down. “I’m glad we did that. Now you should put on that warm jumper you brought so I can show you the stars.”

Later, when they walk back to the campsite, they walk close enough for their shoulders and hands to keep brushing until Zayn finally goes for it and holds Niall's hand. It might take him a while to get used to being allowed to do this now. He wonders if Niall feels this nervous too, this unsure of what's okay and what isn't.

“This is the first night we'll properly see the glow-in-the-dark-stars in the van,” Niall reminds him and squeezes his hand. “Can't wait to see what it's like.”

They get into the van as quietly as possible and Niall starts undressing the same way he always does, while Zayn feels painfully aware of how different things are now. Doesn’t undressing have a completely different meaning now?

He gets under the blanket as quickly as possible and Niall gets in next to him, lying on his back the same way Zayn does. In the limited space at the back of Niall’s van, this means their sides are touching from shoulders to knees and Zayn is hyperaware of Niall’s skin on his, doesn’t dare to move.

“They look beautiful,” Niall eventually says into the somewhat awkward silence. Zayn tries to focus on the randomly placed stars above him and nods.

“Prettiest van of them all, I told you.”

It’s quiet again as they both stare up at the ceiling stiffly. Niall takes a deep breath, then stops again and finally seems to settle on, “Goodnight, Zayn.”

“Goodnight,” Zayn mumbles and doesn’t dare say anything else or move so much as a finger even if he knows he won’t be able to fall asleep like this. Niall stays awake, too, Zayn can tell, and his entire body is still too close to Zayn’s who can’t stop thinking about how soft Niall’s lips were, how he knew exactly what to do.

His skin feels like it’s thrumming and he can’t think straight, just knows for a fact that this isn’t how he wants to spend the first night after Niall’s kissed him. “Niall,” he presses out and the blond jumps a little next to him.

“Yeah?” His voice sounds as strained as Zayn feels.

“Would you, um…I was thinking – would you mind if we, like, kissed some more?”

“Jesus,” Niall says, and then he twists more quickly than the space should allow, towards Zayn. His mouth is on Zayn’s shoulder for a second and Zayn gasps, shifts so he can get a hand on Niall’s side and pull him in.

“Yeah?” he mumbles, mouth against Niall’s neck and he can feel Niall swallow when he nods.

“Please,” he says, gets a hand into Zayn’s hair and pulls until he can kiss the side of his face. “Christ, was wondering when you’d –“

Zayn doesn’t let him finish his sentence, licks the words right from his lips and rolls them over so he has better access. He can feel Niall’s lips curve into a smile under his and then Niall’s shifting one of his legs to the side so Zayn can fit between better and this is – this is great. Perfect.

It’s mostly dark in the van and Zayn lets his hands wander, explore all the parts of Niall he doesn’t usually get to touch this way. He strokes down his side and back up to his chest, traces his collarbones with one finger and licks his Adam’s apple, bites the side of his neck when Niall giggles at that. He sucks on the soft skin, wants to mark it, mark _Niall_ , and then returns to Niall’s mouth.

He lets Niall manhandle him until Niall’s on top, sitting in his lap. Zayn sits up too and accidentally knocks their foreheads together but not even their laughter keeps them distracted for long when Niall licks over Zayn’s front teeth and then behind them and really, Zayn wants to say that he’d have tried this way earlier if he’d known what a brilliant kisser Niall is.

They kiss until Zayn’s lips feel puffy and red, until Niall hisses when Zayn pushes too hard, his lips feeling swollen too. They’re both hard in their boxers but neither moves to do anything about it. For tonight, Zayn’s happy to just kiss Niall, and he does so, lazy and sleepily, until they both fall asleep.

*

The next morning waking up should feel like the best one yet, but the children yelling outside wake them up way too early for how long they were up.

Niall is groaning quietly against the back of Zayn's neck, big spoon as usual, and Zayn smiles for a moment because getting to kiss Niall for hours was absolutely worth a little tiredness. He turns around in Niall's arms and gets a slow blink and twitch of his mouth that might be his attempt at a smile. “‘m tired,” Niall slurs and shuts his eyes again.

“I'll take a shower and get us some coffee at the shop, yeah?” Zayn suggests and starts peeling the blanket back. “You can stay in bed until then.”

Niall makes another small sound and Zayn hesitates for a moment before he presses a kiss to his forehead, the only exposed part of his face. Niall's already asleep again before Zayn's finished grabbing his stuff.

It’s warm already, not just the van heating up in the sun but outside as well. Zayn doesn’t even need the jumper he brought to the showers, even though it’s not even 10am yet. He does kind of wish he brought his sunglasses, the white building containing the showers is almost blindingly bright in the morning sun.

He's back soon considering he wasn't the only one getting breakfast from the small campsite shop and Niall looks as if he's only now waking up. He's pulled on a shirt over the gym shorts he usually wears to bed and is just about to sit down at the picnic table by their van.

“Favourite person in the universe,” he says reverently when he spots Zayn, who hands him his coffee with a shy smile and sets down the bag he brought on the table.

“They had croissants, all fancy like,” Zayn says and sits down opposite Niall, listens to the very happy sound he makes into his coffee.

Niall drinks half of his coffee before he speaks again. “You’ve worn me out with this trip, Malik. I might have to sleep for three days when we get back.”

“Get through this day,” Zayn grins, “and you won’t have to leave your bed until you start your job in two weeks.”

Niall takes the bag of food and starts distributing their breakfast; then looks up at Zayn through his eyelashes. “Will you be joining me?”

Zayn feel the flush crawling up his neck and if that wasn’t bad enough, he isn’t quick enough to catch the surprised sound he makes. Niall’s looking at him straight on now, but to Zayn’s relief, he doesn’t look as confident as he sounded.

“Wait, Zayn,” he says and wipes at his face. “Sorry, I didn't mean to - I dunno, I feel like maybe we should talk about a few things because...like, do we wanna go from friends to more? Cause, like, I'll stop if you want me to.”

“No, god Niall, no,” Zayn says, alarmed. “No, I do want to...um, date you, if you want? I'm just - I'm not sure what I'm allowed to do now, like.”

“Okay,” Niall's biting his lip but Zayn can definitely see a smile there. “Okay, so we're on the same page, that's great. And I'm just as nervous as you are, promise. I feel like going from a friendship to a relationship is, like...there's so many ways we could fuck this up. But we're not gonna, yeah? We only have to talk about stuff and it'll be easy cause it's us. You and me, Zaynie.”

“You and me,” Zayn repeats with a smile. “We'll figure it out.”

“We sure will. Now, are you okay with innuendos? Can I hold your hand in public? What about pet names?”

“Wait, wait, slow down, babe,” Zayn laughs. “That was your first answer, but also: how about we do it the other way round, we'll just experience things as they come and speak up if something bothers us? I'm pretty sure we know each other well enough not to do anything that we'll be completely uncomfortable with.”

“Sounds good to me,” Niall smiles, then looks at Zayn through his eyelashes again in a way that should be outlawed. “Just one last question: what's your opinion on kissing in public?”

This time, Zayn doesn't hesitate to get up and sit back down right on Niall's lap to show him just how little he has against it.

*

Instead of going straight back to London from the campsite, they take a 30 minute drive to Aldeburgh Beach because the weather’s so nice. One last beach day before they head back to muggy, hot London. The city’s not the best place when the summers are actually warm, all the concrete soaks up the heat during the day and keeps giving it off until late at night so nothing has a chance to cool down. It gets unbearable when there’s more than three consecutive hot days.

It’s breezy near the sea, though, warm but not too hot when they park the van in the big car park. “I read they make the best fish and chips in this restaurant,” Zayn says, points to the building on the other end of the car park. “I’ll take you for lunch there.”

Niall grins and walks around the van to sidle up to Zayn. “Like a date?”

Zayn smiles back and leans in to kiss Niall, making a conscious effort to start being a boyfriend and not a best friend. “Like a date.”

Niall hums happily and blinks his eyes open very slowly. “I really like kissing you.”

Zayn laughs fondly. “I really do, too.” Niall starts it this time, and Zayn gets lost in the press of their lips and slide of tongues, fingers tightening in the curls at the back of Niall’s neck. It feels like one of those cliché moments he’d like to be able to keep in a jar so he can relive it over and over again.

There's a sculpture at the top end of the beach, more than twice as tall as them, made from some sort of rusty steel and shaped like a big scallop.

Niall thinks it's hideous and tells Zayn as much as they stroll towards it, Zayn admits it does spoil the beautiful view of the coast a little bit but he also recognises the artistic value. When they get closer, they can read the inscription on the top end of the scallop: "I hear those voices that will not be drowned". The little silver plate on the sculpture explains the quote is from Benjamin Britten’s opera “Peter Grimes”, and that Maggi Hambling made the sculpture as a tribute to him.

Niall doesn't look convinced. “I don't know that opera but I don't see why it had to be a scallop,” he says. “Maybe that's for the region, but really? Not my thing.”

Zayn grins and tugs at his hand. “Let's find a spot on the beach, yeah?”

Niall obviously goes for a swim again, even though the water is freezing cold from what Zayn can tell where he’s standing with his toes in the water. He won’t go any further than his knees, no matter what Niall says and how lovely his smile is.

“At least you came this far in this time,” Niall grins when he gets back, dripping wet. “I call it a success.”

“Maybe you’re just giving better arguments this time around,” Zayn smirks back and lets his fingers linger on Niall’s chest. “Or it’s the fact I can touch you all I want now.”

He really should’ve guessed Niall would see this as an invitation to wrap himself all around Zayn, making them both equally wet. He doesn’t mind that much, though, because Niall’s skin is still warm under all the water and feels way to good against his to complain.

Even Niall can’t make him go for a swim, but apparently he’s happy enough chilling on their towels with Zayn, lying so close it should be uncomfortable with this temperature, but Zayn happily lets Niall rest his head against his chest. He doesn’t think he’ll let Niall out of his reach for at least a few days, and Niall thankfully seems to feel the same way.

“I don’t understand how you can’t want to cool down in the water,” Niall mumbles after a while. “I’m fucking boiling, you’re too hot.”

“Thanks,” Zayn says wrily and expects the pinch to his side before it comes. “No, but we don’t have to cuddle if you’re too warm.”

“I’m not _that_ warm,” Niall protests and turns his head the slightest bit, kisses Zayn’s pec. “Now, if you would consider taking a dip –“

“No way,” Zayn immediately interrupts. “I love you, but no.”

It’s silent for a few seconds as they take in what Zayn just said, that it doesn’t mean what it always used to. Then Niall sits up slowly, staring at Zayn.

“Uh…” Zayn makes. Shit, is it too soon? Should he take it back? “I mean, I don’t –“

“Before you take it back,” Niall says loudly and puts his hand over Zayn’s mouth, “before you take that back, I want you to know I wouldn’t be freaked out if you…if you, you know, meant it _that_ way. Cause, like, I’ve been thinking about what you mean to me for days, weeks, now, and I’m pretty sure that I do. Love you, that is. So if you feel the same that’d be, well, pretty sick.”

He finally takes his hand off Zayn’s face and Zayn sits up so quickly he knocks his ribs against Niall’s knee pretty painfully, but he doesn’t even wince, just slides his fingers into the hair at the back of Niall’s head and kisses him. Niall leans into it quickly, pulls Zayn closer by his hips and tilts his head exactly the right way when he opens his mouth to Zayn’s tongue.

When they pull apart, Niall’s eyes are hooded, his gaze hazy, and Zayn swoops in to peck his shiny lips once, twice more. Niall makes a happy little sound and smiles at Zayn dopily. “…so?”

Zayn smiles back. “That means I love you, too. Of course I do.”

“Like, it’s pretty early in this relationship,” Niall shrugs. “But not if you look at us overall, I think. Dunno, I feel like the past years have been leading up to this, cheesy as it sounds.”

“No, I do too,” Zayn assures him. “Glad you feel the same.”

Niall kisses his cheek, the corner of his mouth and finally his lips. “Me, too.”

They have lunch at one of the fish and chips restaurants by the beach; “one last time”, as Niall puts it, and nap on their towels for a few minutes after, curled up close together, before they start the drive homewards.

They’ve considered going golfing at Ufford Park Woodbridge on the way back from Aldeburgh, Zayn offered it even though it hasn’t been more than a couple of days since he told Niall he’d never come with him. A lot has changed in the past couple of days, though, and if it makes Niall happy, Zayn would do it. He’d probably spend more time admiring Niall than trying to golf, but at least he’d be there.

Ufford Park is a very fancy golf hotel, though, and they’d have to book an overnight stay to be able to play a few rounds on their course. Prices start from £93 a person, which is, like, at least £60 too much for them, so they drive on.

“You can come with back home, one day,” Niall says. “Now that I know you’d do it.”

“You're literally the only person who'd get me to go,” Zayn laughs. “You better feel special.”

Niall's sunglasses mostly conceal his eyes from Zayn but his smile is very bright when he reaches over to grab Zayn's hand. “I do feel very special.” His hand stays in Zayn's until they reach the outskirts of London via the M11 almost two hours later.

*

“D’you think it’s time to let the other boys know we’re back home?” Niall mumbles where his mouth is pressed to somewhere just above Zayn’s armpit. His arm is heavy across Zayn’s stomach and Zayn feels pleasantly drowsy, the morning sun shining in through the gaps in Niall’s blinds.

It’s been a day and a half since they’ve arrived back in London, and Niall’s stayed true to his word and spent the time almost exclusively in bed, Zayn with him more often than not. He’s only gone out to get them food, hasn’t even been to his own flat. Niall’s single room flat is tiny but at least they’re alone and get to hide from their friends, while Zayn still lives with Harry and Liam, who’d immediately know he was back.

And they’ve needed this time by themselves, to figure out how to be with each other, how to be a proper couple. Zayn thinks they have an actual chance now, a chance to be one of those couples that last. It feels like this is what his relationship with Niall is supposed to be like. Now all they have to do is start telling people. Be a couple in front of their friends.

“Reckon it’s time,” he mumbles in response to Niall’s question. “And I mean, as glad as I am we had this time to ourselves, I do miss them.”

“Yeah, me too,” Niall says and moves away to grab his phone. Zayn grumbles in protest and pulls him back in, Niall almost drops his phone when he laughs. “Babe, I’m just gonna text them to come over tonight so we can tell them about our adventures. I’ll be all yours again in a sec.”

Zayn bites his shoulder playfully and hooks an ankle over Niall’s, then presses his face to the skin over Niall’s ribs. His boyfriend giggles a little but keeps focusing on his phone, probably tapping out a text in their group chat.

“Niall,” Zayn mumbles and then starts mouthing along Niall’s ribcage; sliding his palm from Niall’s hip across his tummy and gripping him tightly on the other side.

Niall takes a sharp breath and all but throws his phone away. “I’m done, I’m done.”

Zayn lifts his head to smirk up at him. “All mine?”

Niall’s face and chest immediately flush blotchy red at that and he shifts a little against the bed. “Yours,” he whispers hoarsely.

It sounds better than anything Zayn’s ever heard and he surges up to kiss Niall deeply, hovering over him. He slides one of his hands down to the waistband of Niall’s waistband, slipping a finger underneath teasingly. “We have at least five hours all to ourselves before we should start cleaning up and making your flat presentable,” he says, tilts his head back to give Niall better access when he starts kissing Zayn’s jaw and neck. “And I plan to use them well.”

Niall gasps when Zayn rocks forward once and buries a hand in the hair at the back of Zayn’s head. “Will you ride me?” he gasps out and pretty much everything in Zayn grinds to a halt.

Niall’s breathing heavily beneath him, flush still spreading, and his pupils are blown so wide his eyes look dark. Zayn doesn’t even have words to describe how lucky he feels to see this, to be the one to make Niall look like this, to get to hear this sort of thing.

“Yes,” he breathes out and kisses Niall again. Then he slides his boxers down.

*

“So did you ever even find anything?” Louis asks when the five of them are reunited that evening. “All you posted were snapshots of you doing things that were mostly unrelated to space.”

“Which was great to see,” Harry pipes up, shakes his curls. “You were lucky with the weather.”

“Did you find something but aren't allowed to talk about it?” Liam wants to know excitedly and skilfully ignores Louis’ groan.

The three of them and Niall are perched on Niall's sofa which probably wasn't intended for more than three people and Zayn smiles fondly when he turns around from where he's been hooking his laptop to Niall's TV. He's missed his boys.

“Well, we didn't find any definite proof aliens have in fact been to earth. Wait, babe, come sit here,” Niall interrupts himself and nonchalantly pulls Zayn into his lap. Zayn blushes violently but doesn't protest and for some reason, none of their friends even react. Niall continues as if nothing happened, “We did hear an awful lot of theories, though. And learned lots of genuinely interesting things, so none of you will be able to say it was a waste of time.”

He mock glares at Louis who sticks his tongue out at him. “Where are the pictures, then? I'll need proof before I believe that.”

“Coming, coming,” Zayn grins and starts the slideshow. He's tried making a selection of only the good ones earlier while Niall went out to grab some beer and snacks, but the sheer amount of pictures they've taken over the past three weeks hasn't made that easy. They keep having to pause to tell the story of a photo or go into further detail and sometimes they laugh so hard they don't even get to the end. The other boys laugh along, thankfully, so it doesn't seem to bore them either. As time passes and beer flows, Zayn relaxes back against Niall and doesn't flinch when Niall wraps an arm around his middle or rests his chin on Zayn's shoulder.

“Ni, wanna switch?” he asks quietly when Louis, Liam and Harry all get up to go to the loo or get more beer respectively. “I don't wanna squish you.”

“You're not,” Niall promises and kisses the part where Zayn's shoulder meets his neck quickly. “But if you don't mind? I'm getting a bit warm.”

They switch places and Zayn lets Niall wriggle around his lap until they're comfortable, biting his lip harshly at one point when Niall moves _just so_ , because they're apparently in that phase of a relationship where he sort of wants to rip Niall's clothes off all of the time.

“I almost expected you to have claimed the whole sofa when we got back,” Louis says, raising his eyebrows and looking at them very pointedly. “Apparently you've forgotten the few things you knew about personal space in that van.”

Zayn hides his face against Niall’s back, feels the rumble of his boyfriend’s laughter when he says, “I guess we have. But we all get to sit on the sofa, so no complaints!”

“You won’t hear any from me,” Harry grins. “You can sit in each other’s laps all you want as long as you let me see the rest of your pictures.”

The further they get, the more pictures of each other Zayn and Niall seem to have taken and Zayn thinks that if he’d taken a proper look at his camera roll, he would’ve realised his feelings earlier. Niall is his absolute favourite motive, but he’s Niall’s, apparently, judging from the amount of candids he’s taken when Zayn wasn’t looking.

He can see Louis looking over at them a couple of times and fights the urge to take his arms away from around Niall, there’s no reason to be afraid of someone finding out about his feelings for Niall. It makes him wonder, though, why it’s such an instinct to hide them from Louis. It’s just – Louis spent the first year after Zayn met Niall teasing him about his “boyfriend”, while Zayn kept getting defensive and telling him they were just friends. Niall had a girlfriend when Zayn met him, so he was off limits right from the start. He remembers a week, after they’d known each other for a couple of months, when he found out Niall is bi and felt off kilter even though he was the one in a relationship at the time.

Looking back, Zayn realises that his and Niall’s friendship was just a series of bad timing and denials and that if he’d allowed himself to think about Niall that way earlier, they might’ve gotten to the point they’re at now months, years ago. He’s pretty sure it was always there, this feeling, he just never let himself acknowledge it. Denying has become his second nature.

When they get to the pictures of their last day, at Aldeburgh Beach, Niall turns his head just enough to smile at Zayn and mouth “love you”, to which Zayn tightens his hold around him and pulls Niall even closer to his chest. The selfies they’ve taken look almost sickeningly sweet and Zayn loves them a lot, these are the only ones they haven’t looked through yet.

There’s a few shots of the beach and coastline, one of Niall making a disgusted face at The Scallop, at which Zayn snorts against Niall’s neck softly, a close up of Zayn’s eyelashes while he’s dozing at the beach (“look at Malik’s eyelashes!” Niall shouts, and Harry nods reverently) and the rest are selfies. The slideshow goes through them one by one; smiling brightly, Niall talking and Zayn laughing, Niall kissing Zayn’s cheek, Zayn’s head on Niall’s shoulder.

They’re at one of the two of them on their towels, a crooked one Niall took with him resting his chin on Zayn’s chest, when Louis blurts out, “Wait, hold up.”

Everyone turns to look at him where he’s leaning past Liam to look at Niall and Zayn, eyes narrowed the way he does it when he’s onto something. Zayn swallows nervously.

“Listen, I haven’t asked either of you this in a couple of years, but this,” his gesture engulfs both of them and Zayn’s laptop with the pictures, “this is getting ridiculous. Are you two finally an actual couple?”

“Lou,” Harry gasps, “you can’t just ask them that!”

Zayn just keeps looking at Louis. “Are you saying you’d like us to be?”

“Obviously,” Liam says and then claps a hand in front of his mouth like he didn’t mean to say that. “Sorry, I just meant we’ve all sort of been rooting for you for ages.”

Louis and Harry both nod in agreement and Zayn stares at them a little incredulously, Niall on his lap just as stunned. Zayn wonders how he’d react to this if he hadn’t made sense of his feelings yet, if Niall and him hadn’t actually talked about everything.

“Okay,” Niall says slowly. “So what made you ask now?”

“Yeah, Louis,” Harry mumbles and he’s staring at Niall’s fingers that are slowly tangling with Zayn’s. His eyes widen.

“Well, something’s changed,” Louis tries to explain, “like, intensified? Dunno, I can’t put my finger on it. But you haven’t answered the question yet.”

There’s no dignified way to do this at the point they’re at, Zayn decides. He doesn’t want to tell Louis he’s right, he’d never let him live that down.

“Good intuition, Louis,” he grins instead and kisses the side of Niall's neck, the only uncovered part of him he can reach. “Though it did take you the whole night.”

Liam claps Zayn hard on the back and shouts “I'm so happy for you two, so happy!”, while Louis yells “Shut the fuck up, you've always been all over each other!” but he looks ready to burst with happiness, and Harry smiles impossibly wide as he comes over to give them a hug. It's loud and messy and wonderful, it's absolutely perfect.

*

“Hey, Zayn, can I say something really cheesy?” Niall whispers into the darkness when he and Zayn are in bed much later.

Zayn can't quite hold in the smile when he rolls over to face Niall, not more than his teeth and eyes visible in the dark. “Go ahead.”

“You said we wouldn't find anything on our trip, back when we were just starting,” Zayn hums in acknowledgement so Niall continues, “we did though, didn't we? We found each other, like this. Like, this way we hadn’t found before we started, do you know what I mean?”

Zayn thinks of the sun and Niall's smile, of stars, real ones and glow-in-the-dark ones in the back of a car, thinks of getting another box and putting them up here, over Niall's bed, thinks of Niall's hand in his and the feeling he gets whenever Niall does anything.

He finds Niall's mouth in the dark and tries to tell him all of these things without words, and when Niall's lips curl up into a smile under his, he thinks he got it.

“Yeah,” he says, Zayn's nose brushing Niall's. “Yeah, we found each other.”

 

**Author's Note:**

> constructive criticism is appreciated :)
> 
> right, so. i had niall and zayn go on quite the road trip in this one and first of all i want to clear up that i haven't been to any of these places (except london which i don't describe at all) so sorry for any inaccuracies! most of the places i had them go are real existing places and i googled them extensively (my favourite is the spaceguard centre & observatory, i still have it bookmarked and plan to visit one day if possible), but there might still be mistakes or things i made up to fit into the story better. the archives of the british ufo research association are completely fictional, except for the zodiac on the ceiling although that is actually located in a bookshop in new york. the other archives they visited are real places but i invented everything they find inside because they're technically just archives to help people research their family history. the towns they visit, sights they see, moors they drive through and the ufo trail plus camp site are real places as well. i spent so much time on websites and google maps that i really wanna road trip across england and wales now to see it all myself. i quoted some actual sightings people have reported which i found on different ufo websites (there's a lot to find on the internet, i'm telling you) and i don't mean to make fun of anyone with this fic, just to clear that up. the space stuff should all be correct since i did a lot of research there as well (turns out i know less about space than i thought? in technical terms at least) but no guarantees. hit me up with any more questions or if you find something wrong!  
> Thanks for reading, hope you enjoyed it!! :)


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